By George Koumoulllis
According to a recent CyBC survey, 48% of respondents learned about the events of 1974 mainly outside school, 10% mainly at school, and 37% both in and out of school. This trend is deeply worrying. Teaching contemporary history is crucial for developing informed and engaged citizens, capable of making better decisions for the present and future. It provides lessons from past mistakes and achievements, fosters critical thinking and empathy, and shows how history shapes current social, political, and economic realities.
In Cypriot schools, topics such as EOKA B, Grivas, Makarios, or the junta are often considered taboo. Many teachers hesitate to address these matters frankly, fearing accusations of disloyalty or anti-Greek sentiment. As a result, students gain only superficial knowledge of 1974 and become vulnerable to populist narratives from any side. Unlike Germany, which after World War II immediately tasked social scientists with creating school textbooks on Hitler, Nazism, and the Holocaust, Cyprus has not adopted a similarly rigorous approach. In Germany, these subjects are compulsory at all levels of secondary education, discussed openly at universities, and Holocaust denial is a criminal offence.
A comparable approach should be adopted in Cyprus. For instance, portraying EOKA B as a “patriotic organisation” (as has been heard) could be deemed illegal. Instead, we see banners in some football stadiums glorifying EOKA B. Grivas, founder of the criminal and traitorous EOKA B, has not been critically examined; parties such as DISY and ELAM even hold annual memorials in his honour, despite Parliament’s December 2022 resolution urging all state institutions to respect the wounds of the Cypriot people and refrain from glorifying those who opposed democratic legitimacy, including EOKA B and the coup government. These events relate directly to 1974 but are absent from the school curriculum.
Can we refer to a Greek invasion?
How many students could meaningfully discuss questions such as: What happened on 15 July 1974? The coup? Greek invasion? Junta invasion? Was the junta not born from Greece? Is it accurate to call it a “Greek” invasion? On 20 July, did Turkey invade or intervene? If an invasion, why was it brutal? Were civilian deaths and rapes a factor? Indeed, aren’t all historical invasions brutal? These are precisely the debates students should be able to engage in rationally in class.
The most alarming aspect is that history education in Cyprus fosters hostility between the two communities, at a time when efforts to reunite the island are being renewed after Erhürman's election. This animosity largely stems from the way history is taught. It is unacceptable for Greek Cypriots to see Turkish Cypriots as “eternal enemies,” or vice versa. With such entrenched ideologies, how can a shared homeland be built? How can mutual trust be established? While it is important to educate citizens about the implications of a bizonal, bicommunal federation, it is even more urgent to uproot the mutual hostility simmering especially among the young.
Currently, history teaching in both Greek and Turkish Cypriot schools focuses on rote memorisation of events. Any deviation from the official narrative is considered “historical distortion.” Thus, the attempt to present history accurately, drawing on multiple independent sources and reflecting both communities’ perspectives, is itself labelled a distortion. A history textbook incorporating plural perspectives is essential to build mutual trust. This approach should be supported by both Greek and Turkish Cypriot media.
The graphic portrayal of atrocities committed by “the other side” must stop. Just recently, on 15 November, the Bayrak channel depicted the 1967 killing of 24 Turkish Cypriots in Kofinou with photographic material; three days later, CyBC aired a programme on the massacre of Greek Cypriots in Kontemenos. Could these stations break the “glass ceiling” of reporting and provide a level of information previously considered impossible? Could Bayrak discuss the Palekythro crime and CyBC the Tohni killings, demonstrating that atrocity knows neither religion nor nationality? Only if the answer is yes can we hope for genuine reconciliation.
George Koumoulllis is an Economist and Social Scientist