Makarios Dies

Archbishop Makarios III had led Cyprus since independence, apart from the months in 1974 when the coup forced him abroad. He returned in December 1974 to a divided island. In early 1977 he met Rauf Denktaş twice under UN auspices, and on 12 February the two men agreed four guidelines for a federal settlement. It looked as though talks might finally move.

His health did not hold. Makarios suffered a first heart attack in April 1977. In the early hours of 3 August, after further attacks, he died in Nicosia at the age of 63. Thousands of people came out onto the streets, and the slogan “He lives” appeared on walls across the south. He was buried at Throni, a hilltop above Kykkos Monastery in the Troodos mountains.

Under the constitution the President of the House of Representatives became acting president. That was Spyros Kyprianou, who had served as foreign minister from 1960 until 1972, founded the Democratic Party in 1976 and became Speaker after that year’s elections. He was the only candidate nominated for the presidential election due on 10 September 1977, so the vote was cancelled and he took the oath of office on 3 September. He was returned unopposed again in 1978 and won in 1983, holding the post until 1988. Months into his presidency, in December 1977, his elder son Achilles was kidnapped and held for four days before being released.

Kyprianou promised to keep to the line Makarios would have taken. In practice he had less room to manoeuvre. Refugees from the north had become a strong political force, and he took up their demands for the right of return and for freedom of movement and settlement across the island. That widened the gap with the Turkish Cypriot leadership, which wanted firm controls between the two zones. It took until May 1979 for Kyprianou and Denktaş to reach their own agreement.