According to the final vote count results announced by the Cypriot authorities on the 17th, in the presidential election that concluded on the same day, Nikos Anastasiades, the leader of the Democratic Rally party, secured the top position with a vote share of 45.46%. He will enter the second round of the presidential election alongside the candidate supported by the ruling party, Stavros Malas, who came in second.
As per the provisions of the Cypriot constitution, if no candidate receives more than 50% of the votes, a second round of voting is required. Therefore, Anastasiades and Malas will compete in the second round of voting scheduled for the 24th.
Polls indicate that Anastasiades is likely to easily defeat Malas in the second round and be elected as the next President of Cyprus.
Statistics show that the number of registered voters for this election was 545,491, with a voter turnout of 83.14% in the first round, which is 5 percentage points lower than the previous election.
The incumbent President Christofias did not seek re-election, making him the first president since Cyprus gained independence in 1960 to not run for a second term.
Cyprus is currently mired in an economic crisis. The Cypriot government applied for assistance from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund last June to save the banking sector affected by the Greek debt crisis and to address the shortfall in government finances. The Cypriot government reached a preliminary assistance agreement with the European Commission, the European Central Bank, and the International Monetary Fund at the end of last year, but the signing of the final agreement will wait until the new Cypriot government takes office. Therefore, the main issue facing the next president will be to quickly sign the assistance agreement to secure funds to replenish the increasingly depleted treasury.
(Source: Xinhua News Agency)
