Turnout: 66.91%
About this election
Cyprus held parliamentary elections on 24 May 2026. The centre-right Democratic Rally (DISY), led by Annita Demetriou, remained the largest party with 17 of the 56 contested seats on 27.15% of the vote, ahead of the left-wing Progressive Party of Working People (AKEL) under Stefanos Stefanou on 15 seats (23.86%). The headline of the night was the surge of the far-right National Popular Front (ELAM), which rose to 8 seats (10.90%), its best-ever result, level with the centrist Democratic Party (DIKO) of Nikolas Papadopoulos. Two newcomers entered parliament: the reformist alliance ALMA with 4 seats (5.83%) and the Direct Democracy movement of social-media personality Fidias Panayiotou, also with 4 (5.42%). Turnout was 66.91%.
Cyprus is a presidential republic, and parliamentary elections do not directly determine the government — President Nikos Christodoulides, elected in 2023 as an independent, governs regardless of the legislative balance. That makes these elections partly a referendum on the parties themselves, and 2026 registered deep public frustration: a string of corruption and "golden passport" controversies in previous years had eroded trust in the establishment parties, opening space for both the far right and anti-system newcomers.
The House of Representatives has 80 seats, but only 56 are filled: the 24 seats allotted to the Turkish Cypriot community have remained vacant since 1963-64, and the divided north has been outside the Republic's control since 1974. The 56 seats are elected by proportional representation from constituencies matching the six districts of the government-controlled area, with a 3.6% national threshold. Because the president and government are chosen separately, the House functions chiefly as a legislature and a check rather than as the maker of governments.
DISY and AKEL have been the two poles of Cypriot politics for decades. DIKO and the socialist EDEK are smaller established parties; DIPA a centrist breakaway. The disruptors were ELAM, a nationalist far-right party whose steady rise culminated in its strongest result yet, and two fresh forces: ALMA, an anti-corruption alliance of socialists, greens and centrists, and Direct Democracy, led by the YouTuber-turned-MEP Fidias Panayiotou, which channelled younger, anti-establishment voters.
The defining trend was the erosion of the old DISY-AKEL duopoly and the fragmentation of the vote across more parties than ever. Voters disillusioned with the mainstream split between the nationalist right and novel protest movements, leaving a more crowded and polarised chamber. The cost of living, housing affordability and the perennial Cyprus problem — the island's division and the stalled reunification talks — dominated the campaign.
With no party close to a majority of the 56 seats and no automatic governing coalition (since the executive is the president's), parliamentary politics entered a phase of shifting, issue-by-issue alliances. President Christodoulides continues to govern, but must now legislate through a more fragmented and assertive House in which the far right and newcomers hold the balance on many votes.
The new House will shape legislation and oversight for the rest of the presidential term, with the strengthened ELAM and the anti-system newcomers changing the tone of debate. Reunification diplomacy, EU policy, and the housing and cost-of-living pressures that fuelled the protest vote remain the central issues facing Cypriot politics. For DISY and AKEL, the task is to halt their long decline and reabsorb voters lost to the newcomers; for the smaller and newer parties, it is to convert a protest vote into durable representation. With the presidential and parliamentary cycles running on separate clocks, the next major test will be the presidential election, in which the realignment seen in 2026 is likely to be felt again.
Hanging over every Cypriot election is the unresolved division of the island. Since the events of 1974, the northern third has been outside the Republic's control, and the 24 House seats reserved for the Turkish Cypriot community have stood empty since the 1960s. Decades of UN-mediated talks aimed at a bizonal, bicommunal federation have repeatedly stalled, and reunification remains both a constant of political rhetoric and a question that this parliament cannot itself decide. The issue framed the 2026 campaign alongside more immediate economic worries.
The breakthrough of ELAM, ALMA and Direct Democracy reflected a wider loss of faith in the established parties. A series of corruption and "golden passport" scandals, the high cost of living, and acute housing pressure on younger Cypriots created an opening that the nationalist right and anti-system movements exploited from different directions — ELAM with hardline positions on migration and identity, and Fidias Panayiotou's Direct Democracy with an online, anti-establishment appeal that drew in younger and first-time voters.
Central Elections Service of the Republic of Cyprus — elections.moi.gov.cy.
Compiled and reviewed by Bartłomiej Paruzel, Election Data Analyst, from official results. See our data methodology.