Makarios III - Early life, studies, and Church career (1913-1950)

Archbishop and primate of the Orthodox Church of Cyprus, and president of Cyprus (1960–74, 1974–7), born in Ano Panayia, SW Cyprus. He was ordained priest in 1946, elected Bishop of Kition in 1948, and became archbishop in 1950. He reorganized the enosis (union) movement, was arrested and detained in 1956, but returned to a tumultuous welcome in 1959 to become chief Greek-Cypriot Minister in the new Greek–Turkish provisional government. Later that year he was elected president. A short-lived coup removed him briefly from power in 1974. On his death, the posts of archbishop and head of state were separated.

Archbishop Makarios III
1st President of the Republic of Cyprus
In office August 16, 1960 – August 3, 1977
Vice President(s)	Dr Fazil Kucuk
Preceded by	New office
Succeeded by	Spyros Kyprianou
Born	August 13, 1913 Panagia, Paphos, Cyprus
Died	August 3, 1977
Political party	No party

Makarios III (Greek: Μακάριος Γ'; born Mihalis Christodoulou Mouskos (Μιχαήλ Χριστοδούλου Μούσκος), August 13, 1913—August 3, 1977) was archbishop and primate of the autocephalous Cypriot Orthodox Church (1950-1977) and first President of the Republic of Cyprus (1960-1977).

Early life, studies, and Church career (1913-1950)

Makarios was born in the village of Panayia in the Paphos District on August 13, 1913.

Makarios was a charismatic and popular figure in Cyprus, but his relationship with the British authorities was fraught. Like many public figures in the Greek Cypriot community on Cyprus, in the 1940s and 1950s he was an active supporter of Enosis, the union of Cyprus with Greece.

Enosis and EOKA (1950-1955)

On 18 September 1950, Makarios was elected Archbishop of Cyprus. In this role he was not only the official head of the Orthodox Church in Cyprus, but became the Ethnarch, de facto national leader of the Greek Cypriot community. This highly influential position put Makarios at the centre of Cypriot politics.

During the 1950s, Makarios embraced his dual role as Archbishop and Ethnarch with enthusiasm and became a very popular figure among Greek Cypriots. Makarios undoubtedly had common political ground with EOKA and was acquainted with its leader, the Greek soldier and politician George Grivas, but the extent of his involvement is unclear and disputed.

Exile, escalation and Taksim (1955-60)

On August 20 of the same year, Greece submitted a petition to the United Nations requesting the application of the principle of self-determination to the people of Cyprus. Makarios, characterised in the British press as a crooked Greek priest and viewed with suspicion by the British authorities, was exiled to Mahe Islandin the Seychelles on 9 March.

In the latter years of the 1950s, the Turkish Cypriot community first began to float the idea of ‘Taksim’ or partition, as a counterweight to the Greek ideal of Enosis or union. Advocates of Taksim felt that the Turkish Cypriot community would be persecuted in a Greek Cyprus, and that only by keeping part of the island under either British or Turkish sovereignty could the safety of the Turkish Cypriots be guaranteed.

Makarios was released from exile after a year, although he was still forbidden to return to Cyprus.

On 1 March 1959 the archbishop returned to Cyprus to an unprecedented reception in Nicosia, where almost two-thirds of the adult Greek Cypriot population turned out to welcome him. Presidential elections were held on 13 December 1959 and Makarios roundly defeated his rival, lawyer John Klerides – father of future president and Makarios ally Glafkos Klerides – receiving two-thirds of the vote. Makarios was to become the political leader of all Cyprus as well as the communal leader of the Greek Cypriots.

Primacy and presidency (1960-1963)

After his election Makarios, together with the Vice-President-elect, Dr Fazıl Küçük, continued to draw up plans for Cyprus’s future. By now, Makarios – always a canny politician – had accepted that Enosis was not to be, and that the only outcome which could secure harmony in Cyprus was robust independence. Taking office on 16 August 1960, the day the Union flag was finally lowered in Nicosia, Makarios moved towards the moderate centre of Cypriot politics and now pursued a policy of non-alignment, cultivating good relations with Turkey as well as Greece and becoming a high-profile member of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM). There was increasing acrimony between Turkish and Greek Cypriots about the workings of the constitution, and Makarios was forced to act to salvage the machinery of state from imminent collapse. However, the Amendments were seen by many Turkish Cypriots as threatening constitutional protections for them against domination by the majority Greek Cypriots. In response to Makarios’s proposals, most Turkish Cypriots in public office, including Vice-President Kucuk, resigned, and large numbers of Turkish Cypriots moved out of ethnically-mixed areas into villages and towns where the population was already largely Turkish Cypriot. There is still dispute over the motives for this, some arguing that it was made necessary by the intimidation of the Turkish Cypriots by the Greek Cypriots, and others suggesting that the Turkish community was sabotaging the Cypriot settlement and already preparing for partition by Turkey.

Makarios and the Cyprus Problem (1964-1977)

The political landscape in Cyprus remained interminable. Makarios continued his high-profile neutrality, but ultimately failed either to reassure the Turkish Cypriots that they were safe in an independent Cyprus, or to convince the Greek Cypriots that independence was a satisfactory alternative to assimilation within a Greater Greece.

President Makarios, seeking a fresh mandate from his constituency, announced in January 1968 that elections would be held during February. Even though there were 16,215 abstentions, Makarios's overwhelming victory was seen as a massive endorsement of his personal leadership and of an independent Cyprus. Some Cypriots opposed Makarios's conciliatory stance, and there would be an unsuccessful attempt to assassinate him in 1970. Sometime in the late summer or early fall, Grivas (who had attacked Makarios as a traitor in an Athens newspaper) returned secretly to the island and began to rebuild his guerrilla organization, which became known as the National Organization of Cypriot Fighters (Ethniki Organosis Kyprion Agoniston B--EOKA B). The junta probably would have agreed to some form of partition similar to the Acheson Plan to settle the Cyprus question, however it faced the rejection of Makarios. Grivas, from hiding, directed terrorist attacks and propaganda assaults that shook the Makarios government, but the president remained a powerful, popular leader.

Relations between Nicosia and Athens were at such a low ebb that the colonels of the Greek junta, recognizing that they had Makarios in a perilous position, issued an ultimatum for him to reform his government and rid it of ministers who had been critical of the junta. In the end, however, Makarios bowed to Greek pressure and reshuffled the cabinet.

Working against Makarios was the fact that most officers of the Cypriot National Guard were Greek regulars who supported the junta, and its desire to remove him from office and achieve some degree of Enosis.

In the spring of 1972, Makarios faced an attack from another quarter. For more information see ecclesiastical coup.

Grivas and his one-track pursuit of Enosis through terrorism had become an embarrassment to the Greek Cypriot government, as well as to the Greek government that had sponsored his return to the island.

On May 3, 1974, Makarios sent the Greek government a letter that identified certain Greek military officers stationed in Cyprus as undermining the Cypriot government. In a second letter addressed on July 2, Makarios demanded the withdrawal of all Greek officers in the island. Tetenes suggested as a compromise that Makarios personally select the replacement officers from a roster of Greek officers. Makarios fled and was replaced by Nikos Sampson, a Cypriot newspaper editor and politician.

While addressing the UN Security Council on July 19, 1974, Makarios accused Greece of having invaded Cyprus and of posing a threat to all the Cypriots, either Greek or Turkish Cypriot.

With the Greek government in collapse, however, and the British facing constitutional uncertainty of a hung parliament, Turkey which was trying to find a chance to capture a part of Cyprus, as the only Guarantor power which was willing to act, found its best chance and acted. To Greeks and Greek Cypriots, it represented the execution of a long-standing ploy to re-establish Turkish control of a large portion of Cyprus. Having succeeded in securing international recognition that his administration was the rightful government of the whole island, he returned to Cyprus and focussed solely on restoring Cypriot territorial integrity.

Death and legacy

Makarios III died unexpectedly on August 3, 1977, after a heart attack. He is possibly the most significant figure in recent Cypriot politics, and his efforts to secure international consensus on the legitimacy of the Greek Cypriot government after 1974 have provided the backdrop against which the whole recent political history of the Cyprus Question has been played out.

Quotes

“Έλληνες Κύπριοι, νενικήκαμεν!” (“Greek Cypriots, we have won!”) - Makarios, March 1, 1959 following the signing of the London agreement for the independence of Cyprus

“The coup of the Greek junta is an invasion, and from its consequences the whole people of Cyprus suffers, both Greeks and Turks.” - Makarios, July 19, 1974, UN Security Council

“Independence was not the aim of the EOKA struggle. Foreign factors have prevented the achievement of the national goal, but this should not be a cause for sorrow, New bastions have been conquered and from these bastions the Greek Cypriots will march on to complete the final victory.” - Makarios, August 16, 1974

Preceded by: Makarios II	Archbishop of Cyprus 1950– 1977	Succeeded by: Chrysostomos
Preceded by: New office	President of Cyprus 1960– July 1974	Succeeded by: Glafkos Klerides (interim)
Preceded by: Glafkos Klerides (interim)	President of Cyprus December 1974 – 1977	Succeeded by: Spyros Kyprianou

Endnotes

Ange S.