ELECTIONS: Akinci, Siber aim to lead Turkish Cypriot elections

With about 80% of the 175,000 Turkish Cypriot voters going to the polls on Sunday, three main contenders are vying for the presidency of the breakaway TRNC in the north of Cyprus.

Incumbent Dervis Eroglu is running as an independent with the support of the UBP he once led and the Democratic Party of Serdar Denktash.
Veteran politician and former mayor of the Turkish part of Nicosia, Mustafa Akinci, hopes to win over the frustrated voters who want to see programme in the Cyprus reunifications talks, while Sibel Siber is the only female candidate and is being supported by the left-wing Turkish Republican Party (CTP) previously headed by Mehmet Ali Talat, the previous community leader who came close to agreeing to a Cyprus solution, but lost the presidency.
With none of the seven candidates expected to win 50% of the votes in the first-past-the-post system, it is likely there will be a run-off between any two of Eroglu, Akinci and Siber next Sunday.
Kudret Ozersay, the previous chief negotiator for the Turkish Cypriot community, is not expected to gain more than 10% or 15% of the votes, but is seen as a ‘kingmaker’ and is expected to have a more active role in Turkish Cypriot politics in the near future.