Formation and early years Members were drawn from the committee for re-establishment of democracy in Greece, and fighters from
Lyssaridis's group during the 1964 clashes between
Greek and
Turkish Cypriots. Lyssaridis was the personal physician of Archbishop
Makarios III, the first president of independent Cyprus, whom the party supported. The party's name was inspired by Greek's
Centre Union (EK) of
Georgios Papandreou. It positioned itself in "the space inbetween" (neither left nor right). EDEK had links to the international
Non-Aligned Movement and was opposed to the right-wing
Colonels' regime in Greece. Many of the party's members were part of the armed resistance to the
15 July 1974 coup against Makarios. The leader of the youth section of the party,
Doros Loizou, was shot and killed in
an attempt to murder Lyssaridis in August 1974. Several members of the party's youth section (EDEN) with
Trotskyist tendencies were expelled between 1979 and 1984, who then formed Aristeri Pteryga (Left Wing). During the late 1990s, EDEK negotiated with several minor parties, planning to merge all political forces between the communist AKEL and the conservative DISY into a major centrist party. It merged with two small groups, the Renewal Movement and the Independent Personalities Group, in February 2000. This was marked by its name change to "Movement for Social Democracy" (KISOS), which was also intended to bring the party closer to European social democratic parties in terms of both values and appearance. However, only two months after the merger, the members of the Renewal Movement left, citing a "lack of trust" vis-à-vis old EDEK members. Therefore, basically "the new KISOS was the old EDEK". In the
elections of 21 May 2006, the first since the referendum, the party increased its vote share to 8.9%, and won 5 out of 56 seats. EDEK backed
Dimitris Christofias of the
Progressive Party of Working People (AKEL) in the second round of the
February 2008 presidential election. On the proposal of EDEK's Political Bureau, 109 members of its Central Committee voted in favor of supporting
Christofias, five voted against, and two abstained. In February 2010 EDEK quit from the government coalition due to its dispute concerning the decisions of
Dimitris Christofias in the Cyprus Problem. The party leader,
Yiannakis Omirou, was elected as President of the House of Representatives of the Republic of Cyprus, following the
2011 general elections, in which EDEK obtained 8.93% of the votes and five seats in Parliament. In the
February 2013 presidential election, EDEK backed the independent candidate
Yiorgos Lillikas. The former minister of foreign affairs in
Tassos Papadopoulos' cabinet. In the second round, EDEK decided not to back any other candidate, neither the DISY candidate
Nicos Anastasiades, or AKEL candidate Stavros Malas. In January 2015, House President
Yiannakis Omirou resigned from EDEK's leadership. In March he was succeeded by his deputy
Marinos Sizopoulos. In November 2022, the party's name was changed to EDEK Socialist Party. ==Election results==