Cyprus democracy vulnerable to backsliding as trust in institutions erodes

Public confidence in the independence of Cyprus’s judiciary has fallen markedly in recent years, while distrust in institutions and weak accountability could leave the country more vulnerable to democratic backsliding, speakers told the Cyprus Forum . The warning came during a panel titled Democratic Backsliding in Europe: How Resilient Is Cypriot Democracy? , chaired by Loucianos Lyritsas, Cyprus correspondent for Deutsche Welle and part of the investigative and editorial team behind Omega TV’s De Facto documentary series. Knowledge partners for the discussion were the Comparative Democratic Studies Unit and the Centre for the Rule of Law and European Values (CRoLEV). Katerina Kalaitzaki, Lecturer in EU Public Law at UCLan Cyprus and a member of CRoLEV, said public confidence in judicial independence remained a serious concern despite reforms recognised positively in the European Commission’s rule-of-law reporting. She said that in 2026 only 39% of the general population regarded the independence of courts and judges as fairly or very good, down from 50% in 2022. “The independence of the judiciary is not simply about whether a judge is influenced by economic or political interests,” Kalaitzaki said. “If a citizen believes that the state has violated their rights, they need an effective, independent court before which they can challenge the exercise of public power.” She argued that lengthy court proceedings should also be treated as a democracy and rule-of-law issue, not simply as a problem of public administration. “If we continue to have court proceedings that last many years, then a right which exists on paper does not, in practice, provide the same protection,” she said. Katsourides: Cyprus has signs of democratic strain Yiannos Katsourides, Associate Professor at the University of Nicosia’s Department of Politics and Governance and a member of the Comparative Democratic Studies Unit, said democratic backsliding was typically not a sudden collapse but a gradual weakening of institutions. He described it as a process in which checks and balances, judicial independence, media freedom and limits on executive power are gradually eroded, often through measures that appear formally legal. Turning specifically to Cyprus, Katsourides said the country had seen signs of democratic strain throughout its history, although the democratic system had consolidated significantly after 1974. He identified two current concerns: growing public disillusionment with the political system and the failure of state institutions to respond effectively to citizens’ everyday problems. “The way politics is conducted leads people not to believe in the process,” Katsourides said. He argued that this could create fertile ground for populist, far-right or other political forces offering simple or more authoritarian answers to complex problems. The gap between democracy as an ideal and democracy as experienced by citizens was also important, he said, noting that dissatisfaction with democratic performance could make voters more receptive to political figures promising concentrated power and faster decision-making. Parliament urged to exercise stronger scrutiny Katsourides also argued that Cyprus’s presidential system limits the degree of control parliament can exercise compared with a parliamentary democracy. He said, however, that the House of Representatives could make more effective use of the powers it already possesses and strengthen its capacity for oversight. Options could include greater parliamentary scrutiny of appointments, stronger use of existing legislative powers and additional resources to allow parliament to scrutinise the executive more effectively. Kalaitzaki: Democracy is more than elections Kalaitzaki stressed that democracy and the rule of law should not be treated as separate concepts. “Democracy tells us who exercises public power. The rule of law tells us how that public power is exercised and, most importantly, how limits are placed on that power,” she said. A country could continue holding competitive elections while its democratic system was being weakened through reduced accountability, interference with judicial independence, weaker independent authorities or increasing concentration of power, she said. Courts, independent bodies and the media were therefore part of the institutional architecture of democracy rather than secondary safeguards. Later in the discussion, Kalaitzaki identified the anti-corruption system as another area requiring attention. She said the Independent Authority against Corruption had been strengthened in resources and staffing but did not itself have prosecution powers. The wider chain of accountability therefore also had to be strengthened, she argued, including the checks surrounding decisions on whether cases proceed to prosecution. Whistleblowers ‘last line of defence’ Maria Stylianidi, Assistant Professor at Frederick University’s School of Business and Law and a member of the OLAF Supervisory Committee, focused on transparency, accountability and whistleblower protection. She described whistleblowers as “the last line of defence when institutions do not function”, saying they could expose wrongdoing that would otherwise remain hidden. Cyprus has had a legal framework for whistleblower protection since 2022, she said, but legislation alone was insufficient. “The law is the first step. But the law is not enough,” Stylianidi said. She argued that Cyprus still needed to develop a culture in which whistleblowers were not regarded as traitors or informers but as people contributing to accountability and the correction of institutional failures. Awareness of the legislation was also limited, she said, pointing to her experience with students and organisations. “Formal compliance is mainly where we remain. Substantive compliance still has some distance to go,” Stylianidi said. ‘Citizens are not indifferent’ Filippos Petropoulos, founder and president of Debate House, argued that declining voter participation, particularly among younger people, should not automatically be interpreted as political indifference. “Citizens are not indifferent,” he said. “It is an indication that the mechanism which currently allows interaction between citizens and politicians has flaws.” Petropoulos called for new forms of civic participation that could bring citizens directly into structured political discussion. He pointed to citizens’ assemblies and similar models used in Belgium, where randomly selected citizens are brought into deliberative processes and can submit policy proposals. The challenge, he argued, was to redesign democratic institutions so citizens with jobs, families and other responsibilities could participate meaningfully without having to become professional political actors. Transparency International warns over corruption Scott Geytak of Transparency International said the organisation’s global data showed a clear relationship between declining democratic standards and perceptions of corruption. He said the trend over the past decade or more had been towards greater democratic backsliding in many countries, with weakening public confidence in government and elections also affecting the attractiveness of countries as business environments. “Having the laws on the books is half of it,” Geytak said. “The other half is about a culture and a capacity for enforcement.” He argued that countries should not rely solely on formal legal safeguards because anti-corruption capacity could be weakened by political decisions even without changing the law. Maintaining independent media, active civil society, resources for oversight bodies and a strong culture of accountability were therefore essential, he said. The panel ultimately returned to a common conclusion: the resilience of democracy depends not only on elections, but on whether institutions remain independent, trusted and capable of holding power to account.