The building of the Ministry of Public Order and Citizen Protection that houses the Greek Intelligence Service, Photo: ethnos.gr
The question of whether the 1,300 employees of the Greek Intelligence Service must remain outside the evaluation system of public sector employees has given rise to a conflict in the government coalition and a silent war within the service itself. In a surprise move, Minister of Public Order and Citizen Protection Vassilis Kikilias requested the withdrawal of the regulation that he had asked to be proposed for voting a few days earlier. His decision to subject the Intelligence Service employees to evaluation, like all other civil servants, has provoked angry reactions by the smaller partner in the ruling PASOK coalition.
According to sources, the Minister had made the decision after a conversation with chief of the Intelligence Service Theodoros Dravillas who had expressed his dissatisfaction and added that he had not even been aware of the matter, as reported by the Greek edition To Vima. The latest decision of Kikilias was based on the fact that "in the Greek Intelligence Service there is not a list of duties similar to the list available to other state institutions and therefore their exclusion from the evaluation system of their work is not justified."
It is worth noting that the specific employees have not faced any pay cuts, unlike other civil servants. Sources say the decision according to which they should not be included in the evaluation system was made after the federation of the employees in the National Information Service sent a letter to Prime Minister Antonis Samaras. The unionists described in it the service as "specific" and asked for the introduction of a special evaluation system for its employees. As a result, the amendment that was proposed for voting states that a presidential decree should be issued that would determine the procedure for evaluating the work of the Intelligence Service employees in accordance with the specifics and needs of the Service."
Unionists claim that "before the crisis the military and police received several salary increases. The last time the salaries of the members of the Intelligence Service were increased was through an allowance for "high responsibility" in an attempt to improve the performance of the Service after the capture of Abdullah Ocalan in Kenya in early 1999. 60% of the staff of the National Information Service receive around 1,000 euro and the highest salary, which is paid to employees with 37 years of service, amounts to 1,500 euro."
Sources indicate that the change in the ministerial decision after the intervention of the head of the Service is connected with the elections in the union organization of its employees. According to this theory, "the failure to include the Secret Service employees in the evaluation system for civil servants will give impetus to the trade unionists of PASOK who had carried out a protest with this request."
Anyway, all recognize that the intervention of the unionists has saved the Greek "James Bonds" from budget cuts over the past three years. The final decision on their evaluation is not yet clear but it is already a fact that the complaints about another war of party interests associated with the Greek intelligence have become more frequent.