Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras is expected to hand in his resignation to the President of the Republic later today. Most probably before his meeting with the President, Tsipras will address the nation at 8 pm and explain to the people why he is taking the country to early elections scheduled for 20th September 2015.
UPDATE: In his address to the nation, PM Tsipras said among others: “I submit my resignation to the President – the people’s mandate of January 25th has expired.” He did not mention the early elections date.
After the address, Tsipras visited the President and submitted his resignation.
Now Greek media speculate the date for the early elections could be 13. or 20. September 2015.
Full Tsipras speech as soon as uploaded on PM’s website
The decision was taking today during a meeting with Tsipras’ close aides and high- ranking government officials.
The early elections scenarios has been around since middle of July when Tsipras agreed with the creditors for a new bailout and the strictest austerity program of all times, with mainly SYRIZA’s Left Platform to have refused to support pro-creditors policy of the government. But the Prime Minister wanted Greece to receive first the disbursement of the European Stability Mechanism loan and repay the country’s obligations to ECB and IMF.
A total of 40-44 SYRIZA lawmakers have repeatedly refused to vote in favor of the Agreement with creditors, the Prior Actions and the 3. Memorandum of Understanding, with the effect that the coalition government lost the effective majority in Palriament and managed to pass the bills only with the support of the three pro-austerity opposition parties New Democracy, PASOK and To Potami.
So far, the SYRIZA “rebels” MPs have kept their seats in SYRIZA parliamentary group, but with the announcement of the snap polls, the Left Platform is expected to form its own political body. According to latest media information, the Left Platform may abandon SYRIZA even tonight and the name of the new party is expected to be “Popular Unity“.
According to the Constitution, when the Prime Minister resigns, the President of the Republic has the right to give the PM’s mandate to another political party leader in order to form a new government. But this step will be skipped for now, as neither SYRIZA not ANEL will accept to join a coalition government under another party leader, and the other 3 parties (ND, PASOK, To Potami) do not have sufficient number of MPs to form a majority government. Therefore, Greece goes directly from PM’s resignation to early elections.
The name of the highest Judge of Greece’s Supreme Court has been circulating as the person who will lead the caretaker government until the elections. If so, Greece’s will have a female Prime Minister even if for a short time.
Sources around the Prime Minister have been claiming that the new elections will strengthen the power of Tsipras and SYRIZA. According to Greek media, Tsipras is expected to stress in his address to the nation tonight, the necessity of political and economic stability for the country, the implementation of the bailout program as well as an agenda with social profile as counterweight for the upcoming austerity measures.
However, I may dare say, that nothing should be taken for granted and that some important things have changed since last January elections: 1. anti-austerity SYRIZA signed the worst austerity program tabled by the creditors 2. the 62% of NO to Referendum left a lot of voters unsatisfied as the Prime Minister did not take advantage of the result while negotiating with the lenders. Blame the stubborn creditors, blame the government’s lack of Plan B, blame the SYRIZA dilettantism in dealing with governance issues and negotiations, fact is that it has estranged itself from many traditional left-wing voters.
I assume this time Greek voters’ dilemma will be: choose a party to implement the 3. bailout program or a party to not implement it.
Conclusion:
in one or another way, creditors managed to bring down Greece’s left-wing government after 7 months in power.
PS and the new government will have to pass the 3. bailout program Part II in October.
Hmm. The story just gets worse and worse. It’s not as if there is any other party that serious Greek voters can choose…
And as no independent candidates can be voted at snap elections they can only choose the winner of the last vote: the none-voters
i am outside greece…
but all my friends and family in greece are…estranged!
who is syriza? i’m remembering the worst of the papandreou years.
A conspiracy theory would start like this:
a) Samaras’ candidate for president was against “tradition” not a member of the opposition and so it was clear that SYRIZA will come to power
b) End of November although he knew that his time was over the finance minister sent the e-mail with all the measures we see now
c) The bank-run was starting already in November but never made any impact on the stocks, impact on the stocks had only politics but none of the speculators was ever fired although their bosses lost a lot of money by ignoring the savers reactions for quiet a long time
…
I take the opportunity to thank KTG for the prompt and concise information. Everything is possible now “puisque la guerre, c’est la guerre”.
Regarding the constitution in a week Golden Dawn could try to build a government
Now there is a new syriza.Its called popular party. They will elect a leader. Lets wait.
This will be Tsipras and then he can oppose a “SYRIZA” government
The “mood in Portugal” (elections scheduled to first Sunday of October)
Differently from Greece, Portugal does not have the 50 seat bonus: the 250 seats are all assigned by the Hondt method. This roughly makes 42% the threshold for an absolute majority of the winner party or coalition.
But the special treatment Portugal has deserved from European institutions has eroded steadily the support base of all pro-EU parties Until now it has been possible to find the government solutions with either Social Democrats or Socialist absolute majorities or, if not, with relative majority and the convenient help of Christian Democrats. Now pro-EU enthusiast are scoring below 38% in the polls. Greece is weighting very heavily in our domestic pro-EU parties.
@António Thank you for the interesting information. Can you elaborate a bit on “the special treatment Portugal has deserved from European institutions” and “Greece is weighting very heavily in our domestic pro-EU parties”? Is the latest Greek bailout considered by Portuguese voters a good outcome (and hence following the Greek experience of the last 8 months considered worth it), or is it the opposite?
Thanks for the questions. What has surprised me more is the time some IMF remedies are being applied in Greece. VAT increase to 23% is in force in Portugal since 2012 with devastating consequencies. Minimum age for retirement has been increased to 67 since last year. It is clear that the right-wing parties in Greece are much toughter negociator than the Portuguese. Pro-euro Socialist Party por Portugal will probably fail the absolute majority next October. In case of relative majority, some post-election coalition is required to firm the goverment. Case is the remaining option for euro-friendly solutions lies all in the right side. There is the Social Democrats and the CristianDemocrats. Theese two are now running for elections in a pre-election coalition. Making an alliance with the right parties is considered by the socialists as a type PASOK suicide. The rudness used by the European institutions againts a Country the Portuguese feels as being very close is making the euro-friendly parties in Portugal very unconfortable.
creditors managed to bring down Greece’s left-wing government after 7 months in power.
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COMPLETELY WRONG
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Bolsheviks, Marxists – call them as you wish – destroyed the country in half year more than even military junta or previous corrupted politicians (but still not Marxists) did.
This is always the same picture Lenin, Stalin, Trocky, Che Guevara, Castro, Varoufakis…
And always the bloody imperialists are guilty.
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OMG – Greeks receive help 5 bln per annum from EU, similar help on funding (subsidized interests) and they have courage to speak how EU creditors destoyed their government.
Despite EU-racketeers escalating capitalist terror against Greece, ever heard of 0.8% growth for the 2nd quarter or that unemployment went down and what do you think why even Greek businessmen want back the minimum wage of 2010?
If the growth-rate would have been deep minus and if the number of unemployed would have grown the EU wouldn’t be so hard anti-social, all they want is to get Greece cheap as possible and that their companies don’t need to pay taxes and therefore even a 4th “bailout” could come as they need the Aegean as playground for their voters, the rich pensioners.
To get any idea about Junta you should jump under a tank next time you wave your flag on parade or go back behind your iron curtain. Just like Mafia (who is jealous about these “5 billion”), antiziganism and homophobia, the racism in Eastern Europe must come from Stalin’s indoctrination.
Paranoia?
Paranoia because under your name write more persons than only one? If you ask “paranoia” it proves brilliant that I’m on the right path!
Very stupid! Do you know the social situation in Russia under the allmighty Tsars? It was not so nice as Putin’s new orthodoxy tries to convince his new ignorants at home and abroad. Do you know Cuba’s history? The thirst for social justice brought the persons you mention to power, and it was the same desire for freedom and social justice that made them fall. Fortunatly the belief in social justice is still alive and not only in Europe a fundamental value.
1. First Holodomor (famine) with Lenin and Trocky in power, second with Stalin (this one was fabricated to eliminate “class-alien” small peasants who ignored the fantastic revolution, so they a) died from hunger b) if not, became proletariat without land in cities) – millions died from hunger during Lenin/Trocky/Stalin and you want to speak about Tsar?
2. I did not mentioned Cuba not to speak about embargo, but Che Guevara because he was such a disaster, that even Fidel sent him to make revolution abroad (something like Varoufakis and Tsipras.)
3. Communists and “belief in social justice” OMG:
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The Gulag (Russian: ГУЛАГ, tr. GULAG; IPA: [ɡʊˈlak] ( listen)) was the government agency that administered the main Soviet forced labor camp systems during the Stalin era, from the 1930s until the 1950s. The first such camps were created in 1918 — btw it was since the beginning LENIN/TROCKY/Felix Dzerzhinsky– and the term is widely used to describe any forced labor camp in the USSR.
50 million – total number of persons passed through GULAG – Solzhenitsyn (1975)
4-5 million – every single year – Volkogonov (1990s)
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Katyn
After the German invasion of Poland that marked the start of World War II in Europe, the Soviet Union invaded and annexed eastern parts of the Second Polish Republic. Approximately 300,000 Polish prisoners of war were captured by the USSR during and after the ‘Polish Defensive War’.[44] Almost all of the captured officers and a large number of ordinary soldiers were then murdered (see Katyn massacre) or sent to Gulag.[45] Of the 10,000-12,000 Poles sent to Kolyma in 1940–41, most prisoners of war, only 583 men survived…
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Do you want me to continue for example with NKVD/KGP/GRU Mr. social justice?
When you steal letters you have to do it well to not get busted: γκούλαγκ
Sorry I did mention Castro 🙂
You forgot the Revolutionary Insurrectionary Army of Ukraine, the Black Army, slaughtered by Germans, nationalists, democrats and communists. That Trotsky’s Red Army could form and win is all the fault of the Ukrainian and Russian bourgeois as they refused to follow the people’s revolt – provoked by German pillage train by train – against any state and nation and if the ruling classes of the last 100 years would have taught the true history of Eastern Ukraine there wouldn’t be any civil war and no German connection as Germany and Lenin worked together to pillage.
The topic was social justice and communists.
Right. When you mention the German connection with the Ukraine do not forget their ally Austria (always innocent and well protected by the devine powers). The Ukraine concluded a separate peace with Germany in February 1918 but was immediately occupied to put pressure on the still hesitating Bolshewicks that made peace with Germany later, also in Brest-Litowsk, in March 1918. The Ukraine was important for the war effort of Germany and Austria at the end of the war. They needed a.o. horses and grain. As soldiers the Ukrainians were not trustworthy and useless because of their sympathy with the Bolshewicks. (cf Ludendorff, meine Kriegserinnerungen) – I think you know what happened to the Ukrainians that had the pleasure to become Polish citizens between WW I and II.
Don’t forget Gengis Khan 🙂
You started this shit and only because you were boozing with Russians, Ukrainians and Greeks and the latter gave you Tsipouro for free you couldn’t stand.
Everything you said is correct.. There is no moral justification for these criminal acts. But they were all the consequence of international or civil wars. If you want to prevent them in the future or at least understand them you must study the causes. Action and reaction belong together. This does not exclude the personal responsability of the actors implied in this process.
I SO LOVE THIS
QUOTE:
“IN ONE WAY OR ANOTHER, CREDITORS MANAGED TO BRING DOWN GREECE’S LEFT WING GOVERNMENT IN ONLY 7 MONTH”
Is that what happened ?
OR
Is it that the players of this left wing government were corrupt.
That the players of the said left wing government …
GOT GREECE TO SIGN UP FOR HOW MANY BAIL-OUTS FOR GERMANY & THE EU.
Instead of exiting the EU like they promised the people of Greece.
That they are now “dead men walking” for the hate mail & numerous death threats that they must be receiving.
I suppose it sounds more dramatic the left wing government being the victim.
But you know – somehow the truth is lost