Nicosia, Cyprus - An acrimonious election to select the new leader of Cyprus's powerful Orthodox church ended on Tuesday without a clear winner, setting the stage for a new bout of jousting among the island's bickering clerics.
Ballot counting was suspended twice on Monday in a tussle among the clerics contesting the vote, with results emerging more than a day late.
It showed two bishops almost neck-and-neck, giving a third the power to swing the vote as it moves into the second of three phases to select the archbishop in October.
The candidate who won the most votes, Athanassios, is a quiet monk who ran a low-key campaign. Detractors call him a fundamentalist but supporters say he is enlightened.
Cyprus's Orthodox church is an independent arm of the Eastern Orthodox communion and has extensive business interests ranging from banks to real estate.
In a free-for-all never seen in Cyprus's placid world of domestic politics, voting was marred by howls of outright vote rigging by some clerics, complaints about ballot boxes missing, tampered with or arriving at counting centres with delays.
In one case, an 85-year-old priest took the ballots from his parish church home because he wanted to take a nap, not realising election officials were looking for the ballot box.
'It is certainly an election we will remember for years,' said Chrysostomos, the acting head of the church on Cyprus.
Most Greek Cypriots belong to the Orthodox faith and this particular church traces its lineage back to some of Jesus's first followers. It is also one of a few where the laity has a direct say in picking the leadership, as was the case in the earliest Christian churches.
But the complex nature of the voting process has prompted a rethink of the procedure.
'I am sure that under the new Archbishop we will change things. The system is good, it allows the public to have a direct say in the process, but some parts of it are unnecessarily complicated,' Chrysostomos said.
Influence of the Cypriot church in public life has waned in recent years. Its role in politics has also diminished since the death in 1977 of Archbishop Makarios, who was also the island's first president and an 'Ethnarch', or leader of the people.