It is election time in northern Cyprus

Winds have even started blowing hot. Tiny lagoons of rainwater in the fields along the highway from Nicosia to Kyrenia, however, testify to a not that bad of a winter and spring this year compared to the serious draught that scourged the island for the past many years.

The island is green. Weather is great. But, nowadays northern Cyprus is not a good place to visit. Not only does everyone appear to be over excited, but every corner of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus is too noisy. On Sunday, 161,373 registered Turkish Cypriot will go to the polls to elect members of the 50-seat unicameral Republican Assembly. A total of 345 candidates on lists of seven parties and eight independent candidates are competing in the polls. Under Turkish Cypriot electoral laws no public opinion can be conducted in the last two weeks before election day, however polls released just before the ban came into effect ten days ago indicate that in this tenth parliamentary elections, the Turkish Cypriot people will vote to punish the ruling Republican Turks’ Party, or CTP, and the Freedom and Reform Party, or the ORP because of their perceived failure to bring an end to the international isolation of the north.

A visit to Washington this week by President Mehmet Ali Talat, the former leader of the CTP, and his meeting there on Wednesday with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was a last ditch hope for the socialist dominated ruling coalition to minimize its electoral loses. The Clinton meeting, which was originally planned for March 30 but for various reasons could only be held on April 15, perhaps came too late to change perceptions in northern Cyprus and give hope to the electorate that there might be light at the end of the tunnel for an end to the international isolation of the north.

Prime Minister Ferdi Sabit Soyer was also busy creating a Turkish Cypriot version of the Ergenekon controversy. He released a 20-plus page document allegedly showing the conservative National Unity Party, or UBP, leader Deviş Eroğlu having some shadowy deals with the "Turkish Ergenekon gang." That attempt appears to have backfired, but eventual verdict will be made by the people on Sunday.

Bağış enters the scene
Ankara was also active this week in support of the ruling coalition, fearing that a UBP comeback could complicate both the talks and the pro-settlement image of Ankara and northern Cyprus. Egemen Bağış, the state minister in charge of EU affairs arrived on the island Wednesday and a few hours later attended a dinner hosted in his honor by Turgay Avcı, the foreign minister and leader of the ÖRP. At the dinner Bağış reiterated Ankara’s resolute support for pro-settlement people imn northern Cyprus, and underlined the importance Turkey attached on Talat continuing the talks as the Turkish Cypriot negotiator. Though Talat’s "negotiator" position is not under threat and the UBP did not declare that it would change the negotiator, technically Talat is negotiating a settlement with his Greek Cypriot counterpart Demetris Christofias with the authorization of the Turkish Cypriot Parliament. After a change of parliamentary arithmetic in favor of the UBP, even if Talat remains as negotiator obviously life will become more difficult for him.

On Thursday Bağış held contacts with both CTP leader and Prime Minister Soyer and Avcı, for a second time, but left the island without having any contact with the opposition leaders. The message from Ankara was rather clear. Furthermore, that message might be very meaningful if the trends of the electorate with mainland background is to be taken into account. That group of electorate tend to vote in accordance to the wishes of whoever is in government in Ankara. Thus, this open support of the AKP government to the CTP and ÖRP may help diminish CTP’s loses, but will it help ÖRP meet the five percent threshold and enter Parliament remains a big question. Another question, of course, is the one related to how moral it was for the AKP government sent a minister and demonstrate support for some parties just days before elections and how compatible such action with the notion of free vote.