Cabinet reshuffle with a look at the presidential elections

13 October 2014 / 20:10:20 GRReporter

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Just two days after the Greek parliament’s vote of confidence in the coalition government sources insist that Prime Minister Antonis Samaras will proceed to reshuffle the cabinet. According to them, Samaras will use the appointment of Minister of Defence Dimitris Avramopoulos Commissioner for Migration and Home Affairs to make the changes. However, that is only the official reason for the reshuffling, as some cabinet members are expected to leave because they have provoked the Prime Minister’s discontent.

According to the Greek media, first on the list of th outgoing is Minister of Interior Argyris Dinopoulos and the reason is the conflict with Minister of Administrative Reform Kyriakos Mitsotakis on the cuts in municipal employees. Insiders say that Antonis Samaras’ patience snapped when he was informed of Dinopoulos’ statement in which he declared that he supported the new governor of the Attica district, Rena Dourou, in her refusal to enforce the law and submit the lists of delinquent municipal employees.

The cabinet reshuffling will probably affect Deputy Minister of Development Gerasimos Yiakoumatos too. The reason for this might be not so clear but it is not hard to guess that he has not taken specific action on the liberalization of the markets, which falls within his portfolio. Moreover, it is noteworthy that a few months before Yiakoumatos came into office his wife and his brother were brought before the judicial authorities for tax fraud in the family business - a nursing home in the neighbourhood of Neo Psychico.

Government spokeswoman Sofia Voultepsi is likely to find herself out of the cabinet too. The reasons for this are not clear either. At the same time, some of her statements have recently scandalized the public opinion and provoked negative reactions towards the government.

As for the politician who will head the Ministry of Defence, the "candidates" are three, without excluding the probability of another person being appointed. Those are Konstantinos Markopoulos who returned to New Democracy after spending two years in the ranks of Independent Greeks, former Minister of Education and Religious Affairs Konstantinos Arvanitopoulos and former Minister of the Interior Yiannis Mihelakis.

The government received a vote of confidence on Friday night, but only after a few months, the majority of the 155 lawmakers will not be sufficient to elect the new Greek president. The failure could cause early elections and filling the number of votes to the required 180 does not seem an easy task.

For this purpose, the government is looking for suitable candidates who have the support of the majority of the parliamentary parties. Initially, sources claimed that the Prime Minister would propose the leader of Democratic Left, Fotis Kouvelis. The party was a member of the government coalition until June 2013 but withdrew because of the disagreement about how the state broadcaster ERT was closed. A few days ago, however, categorically Kouvelis said that he is not interested in becoming president and put an end to this scenario. Some other sources claim that the Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Evangelos Venizelos also considered two women, namely president of the Organising Committee of the Olympic Games in Athens Gianna Aggelopoulou and Goodwill Ambassador of UNESCO Marianna Vardinogianni.