Photo: Naftemporiki
The difficult economic situation and the uncertainty about the near future of Greece led the Prime Minister George Papandreou to seek a political consensus. He invited all key parties to a meeting in order to conduct political consultations and seek their support in implementing the mid-term recovery plan by 2015. It must be submitted in the Parliament for a final vote in the beginning of next week under the pressure of the supervisory troika and will contain measures for fiscal consolidation and structural reform worth 28 billion euros over the next five years. Except for the financial restructuring, the mid-term plan will include also the privatization program, which should accumulate between 35 and 50 billion euros for the reduction of the continuously growing foreign debt.
The first one to meet the Prime Minister, was the leader of the opposition party New Democracy Antonis Samaras. The two politicians held a 50-minute conversation, after which the right leader gave no statement. Political analysts in Greece identified his silence as a bad sign for the efforts of the Prime Minister to reach a consensus on the measures to be taken. According to the disclosed so far economic program of the opposition New Democracy agrees with the planned massive privatization for the next year, taking stands against only regarding the sale of state lottery (OPAP). This company is still profitable and the blue party do not want it to be sold in times of a crisis for "chicken feed". About the revenue policy and tax reform, Samaras wants tax reductions, which currently is in complete contradiction to the government policy.
In the late hours of the day Antonis Samaras made a statement from the headquarters of New Democracy, which came as a cold shower for the supporters of the idea of consensus. "I can not agree with the policy of the Memorandum, which was already proven wrong", firmly said Samaras. He said that the announced medium-term measures will lead to a deepening of the recession, but not to a decrease in the budget deficit. The leader of the opposition stated that increasing the tax burden paralyzes the production and entrepreneurial forces of the country and urged the government to take into account the proposal of New Democracy to introduce a flat tax of 15% following the model of other Balkan countries. As expected, Samaras supported the privatization and the consignment of the airports, ports and other infrastructure projects.
Meanwhile, at noon, Prime Minister George Papandreou met with the leader of the radical right party LAOS Georgios Karatzaferis. He said he had listened carefully to the position of the prime minister and believes that an "invisible consensus" is not enough. A shared responsibility is needed so that each party should bear part of the burden of tge decisions to be taken in this critical period. It seems that the radical right party will support the socialist government which would give them breathing space when voting on the new reforms. This, however, would not be enough for Greece to convince the foreign creditors that in the country there is an understanding about the economic policy.
Confirmation of the discrd in the political life of the Mediterraneans came also after the statement made by the leader of the radical left party SYRIZA, Alexis Tsipras. He said that the policy of George Papandreou and measures according to the Memorandum of financial aid have brought the country to an unprecedented crisis. According to him the government of PASOK in the past year and a half is delinquent and the desire for a consensus has no basis. "Papandreou has no courage to admit his failure. He insists on the continuation of this criminal policy and seeks accomplices. " The statement of the leader of the radical left party did not surprise anyone, because the position of SYRIZA has been known since the adoption of the Memorandum of financial aid in May 2010. Nevertheless, they responded to the Premier's call for a dialogue, unlike their colleagues from the Greek Communist Party, who did not accept the invitation for a meeting.
"Yes" to all the reforms related to the reductions of the public sector, said the disassociated from New Democracy Dora Bakoyannis, who was accepted in the prime minister's office as the leader of the newly formed party Democratic Alliance. She disagreed, however, with the increases of the tax burden on citizens. "A different tax policy that does not burden and does not destroy the Greeks, would bring more revenue and would be more effective". Dora Bakoyannis propose the Prime Minister to renegotiate the conditions for the tax policy with the troika in the presence of all political leaders.
According to her the dialogues with the creditors of Greece will give a positive result and further increases in taxes and excise duties can be avoided. Another proposal of Bakoyannis was for the Prime Minister to adopt a law through which the number of members of the Greek Parliament to be reduced from 300 to 200 people. This step will have a symbolic nature and show goodwill to the citizens that the government is ready not only to cut pensions and wages and raise taxes, but also to reach into the pocket of the "power of the day".