The Greeks Cypriots

15 Pages 3868 Words

OVERVIEW OF THE CONSTITUTION
The Republic of Cyprus was born in the early hours of 16 August 1960. On that date the Republic’s constitution was signed by the First Governor of the Colony of Cyprus, Sir Hugh Foot, the Consul-General of Greece, George Christopoulos, his Turkish counterpart, Turel, and Archbishop Makarios and Dr. Fazil Kutchuk on behalf of the Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot communities.
The range of signatories reflected the fact that the constitution of Cyprus did not emanate from the free will of its people, who were not consulted either directly or through their ad hoc elected representatives, but from the Zurich Agreement between Greece and Turkey. The terms of that agreement, outlined in the last chapter, were included in the constitution as fundamental Articles, which could not be revised or amended.
The constitution was drafted by the Joint Constitutional Commission created under Part VIII of the London Agreement of 19 February 1959. It comprised representatives of Greece, Turkey, the Greek Cypriot community and the Turkish Cypriot community. But the structure of the constitution again reflected the Zurich Agreement, with various provisions from the 1950 Greek constitution also incorporated along with the provisions of the European Convention of Human Rights in respect of fundamental rights and liberties.
Two main principles underpinned the constitutional structure agreed at Zurich. The first recognized the existence of two communities on the island - the Greek and the Turkish - who, despite their numerical disparity, were given equal treatment. The rights of Cypriots and other communities, which made up the island’s population, were conspicuously ignored.
The second principle, that of partial communal autonomy, aimed at ensuring the participation of each community in the exercise of government, and at avoiding the domination of the larger Greek Cypriot community in administrative matters. These two ...