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tagged: autumn 2011, early elections, evangelos venizelos, George Papandreou, Greece, public polls, second bailoutIs Greece Heading for Early Elections ?
Posted by keeptalkinggreece in Politics
Prime Minister George Papandreou is proud and optimist. And stuns about the obvious, i.e. the success of the tourism industry on Greek islands like Kos. “I am proud about Greece, Greece that gives a battle everywhere, like here in Kos, where with collective effort, with common effort we promote our culture and link it to development, work places and quality tourism, ” Papandreou told the residents of Kos during his short visit on Friday.
From the island of Kos the Prime Minister sent a message of optimism. But the recipients of the message seem to be deaf. They didn’t get it. Millions of Greeks wander around without hope and refuse to share Papandreou’s optimism. No only that. They showed George Papandreou and his ruling ‘socialist’ party PASOK the red card, and dared say that they prefer another political party.
Poll: Main Opposition 6% ahead
After 18 months in strict austerity, two Memorandums of Understanding with the lenders, a second bailout on the way and the threat of selective of collective default, you will hardly find a Greek looking with optimism in the future or believe that the country will overcome the economic crisis.
In the latest Public Issue poll conducted for Greek daily Kathimerini and private television network Skai TV, 36,2 % of the Greeks expressed open support to main opposition, the centre-right Nea Dimokratia. PASOK managed to get just 26,5% in the preference of Greeks. Third party in the preference of Greeks is The Communist party KKE with 11,5%
29% of the asked consider ND-leader Antonis Samaras as the better prime minister, while only 22% have George Papandreou in mind.
Can someone continue to govern and thus take important decisions for the next 50 years of the citizens of this country without the public support? Of course, he can and keep in mind that on the next elections he will try to find his voters with a magnifying glass.
Early Elections and 2nd Bailout
There have been several scenarios in Greece in the last weeks about possible early elections in autumn 2011. The reason for this scenarios were some statements of Greek Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos concerning the second bailout, estimated to be some 100 billion euros. In contrast to his predecessor, Giorgos Papaconstantinou, who apporved the first bailout only with his own his signature, Venizelos apparently favors a more democratic approach. He said that it must be approved by the Parliament with a vote. Venizelos even proposed 180 needed votes (3/5) and not with a simple majority of 151 votes. This idea came while PASOK has only 155 seats in a Parliament of total 300.
A very difficult task taking into consideration that no political party supports the government plans – maybe with the tiny exception of the party of former Foreign Minister Dora Bakoyiannis, who has 4 seats in the parliament.
Should this task fail the government would be obliged to call early elections. But we still have to wait and see the endurance of Papandreou, political and economical. In case he feels his time has come, then he will set for 180 votes and commit a political suicide.
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I am concerned that Papandreou will not agree to early elections. As you suggest, he doesn’t seem to see things the way the rest of the country does. If he did, he would have called for elections before the midterm plan. But, I’m a pessimist. So maybe I just expect the worst.
I don’t know how much better New Democracy would be. But I assume it would be a coalition government? Perhaps with left-leaning parties? Perhaps through compromises, they might arrive at some solutions. I wish I’d hear a a politician say that Greece can’t afford to pay its debts– that it is not going to starve its people to do so. Here’s an article advising “Cousin Greece” to take care of its necessities first, and worry about creditors later:
http://www.minyanville.com/businessmarkets/articles/greece-economy-greece-news-greek-debt/7/7/2011/id/35596
This notion of “stiff the banks who lent it money” is not well thought out. Isn’t it?
The author states:
May I remind that:
Yes, the German banks are holding about the same and the French about 70 billion. But calling to “stiff the banks” is also calling to “stiff” the Greek banks! And that is where our money is. Isn’t it? (Ok, might be on Cyprus or some other tax-haven…???)
How would your neighbour react when he hears you advise your indebted cousin to just file for bankruptcy, hide his assets (paid by those loans) and “tell its creditors to get lost and simply refuse to pay any more debt?”
The problem is NOT that Greece would be shut out of the credit markets for years to come. That’s one of those journalistic and political myths that sound nice but have no real meaning. The problem would be that every decent person who had some legal money put aside in a Greek bank will loose everything. And why? Just to let that bloody ‘cousin’ keep his precious car and other goods for which he never did one day of honest work, but just pulled his credit cards?!
Your neighbour will be the one who will have to get rid of his old Nissan Sunny and has to beg for some food. That ‘cousin’ and his family will shut the door and eat nicely out of their ‘stolen kitty’.
That is the problem with telling banks to “stiff it”.
Yes! Let’s have new elections… That might be fun in the midst of one of the last chances we might get in one or two generations to get us out of this hole.
All the signs are there: Papandreou with this ‘hallelujah-message’, a new ‘closure’ for those who REALLY cheated us in this mess, nice new measure to semi-legitimise almost all illegally built houses so we can get on building in forests and on beaches. And last but not least a few bills to make it easier to wreck nature even further, and heavy investment through expedited EU-funding for infrastructure.
Yes, let’s vote and everything will be good again…