Filenews 17 April 2025 - by Fanis Makrides
"I have nothing to say. Everything I was asked I answered. Be well." The President, Nikos Christodoulides, took a position with these three phrases during his departure from the offices of the Independent Anti-Corruption Authority.
It was obvious that Nikos Christodoulides did not even make a general comment about his presence in the process of being heard by the inspectors, who have as their terms of mandate the investigation of what is attributed to the former President in the book "State Mafia".
It should be noted that the Law governing the operation of the Independent Anti-Corruption Authority does not allow a person who testifies in the context of an investigation to provide information on the content of his testimony.
However, Mr. Christodoulides' intention not to speak to journalists was more than obvious. Both on his arrival (at 08:55), but also on his departure from the building where the Anti-Corruption Authority is housed, he was in a hurry and politely refused to take a position
Mr. Christoulides answered the questions of the research team led by Gabriel Louise McIntyre, for a period of about 1.5 hours.
As we noted in our previous reports, one of the hot issues on which Nikos Christodoulides gave his positions to the inspection officers concerns the private jet used by the former President, Nicos Anastasiades, for his travels.
The author/researcher, Makarios Drousiotis, in his book had formulated the position that the Russian tycoon Dmitry Rybolovlev was being served by Nicos Anastasiades on the issue of his divorce from Elena Rybolovleva. In fact, he claimed that Rybolovlev was paying the bills of the jets used by Anastasiades for his trips abroad in 2015.
In fact, in his book, Drousiotis, in order to reinforce this position, invoked the testimony of Nikos Christodoulides, who was then a government spokesman. Specifically, Christodoulides, based on what Drousiotis writes, clarified in a discussion that the expenses of Nicos Anastasiades' jets were covered by Rybolovlev and not by the Greek Cypriot businessman Chris Lazaris.
Nicos Anastasiades will testify before the investigative committee on April 28. The former President, in his recently published book, notes on the controversial issue: "In order to be believed, he uses the same method that is used in most of the chapters of his works, invoking dialogues that allegedly took place between him and my associates, in this case the then Government Spokesman Nikos Christodoulides. As he falsely claims, during one of the trips, Christodoulides corrected him that it is not Lazaris who pays the air fares, but Rybolovlev. This is the 'irrefutable' testimony to the morbid narrative. Fortunately, Christodoulides is alive and presides over the Republic."
It is considered certain that Anastasiades will submit to the inspectors his book "The Slanderer" that he wrote in order to respond, among other things, to what is attributed to him through the book "State Mafia" during his term in the presidency of the Republic of Cyprus.
According to our information, Anastasiades' testimony is scheduled to take place within a week.
The inspection officers have already written a large part of their finding, with the information stating that they have prepared a four-digit number of pages. It goes without saying that what they wrote is on issues for which the testimonies they received have been completed.
