The meeting between the first and second winners of Greek elections 2012 ended in 24 minutes, making clear there was no common ground for a coalition government between conservative Nea Dimocratia and left-wing SYRIZA. “Samaras’ plan is opposite to ours, the austerity he signed for was rejected by majority,” Alexis Tsipras said after the meeting and stressed that there is “no common ground for coalition.”
Further he said that SYRIZA had asked for a left-government mandate to save the country from depression and austerity, to support the people and boost the economy.”
Tsipras urged that all parties have to show respect to people’s vote and avoid creating “a climate of artificial blackmails.”
Tsipras was the first leader invited to government exploratory talks by Antonis Samaras. ND leader is meeting Venizelos from PASOK and later Kouvelis from Democratic Left.
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PS Taking into consideration that the two men first greeted each other, shook hands, sat down, a coffee was offered, exchanged congratulations on each others’ win and “devoted” a word or two at the general picture of the elections, I pressume the focused on coalition talks did not last more than 112 minutes….
This initial rejection had to be expected. Tsipras ran on a program that opposes the ND/Pasok course and he can’t simply do a complete turnaround within 24 hours after the election. He would have needed more time and a back and forth in negotiations to create a foundation for a compromise. But Samaras didn’t let this happen and eagerly passed the buck to him, probably with sadistic intentions.
Tsipras is a smart guy and certainly is able to do the math on his own. Without ND, the communists and the neo Nazis, there simply aren’t enough seats in parliament to gather a majority. So, he doesn’t have a real chance and I wonder what he will do now, facing this ugly reality. To save face, the leader of the second strongest party has at least to keep up the pretense of negotiations, even though the rules of this screwed up system prevent a success. That’s an embarassing situation.
And in the meantime, while this charade goes on, Greece heads towards the cliffs, without a captain at the helm. Damn.
It took the Belgians almost two years to massage slowly away the old positions. You can’t do that in 1 day.
But they had a functioning civil service. Even with a government Greece hasn’t.
Right, Antonis. Plus, Belgium wasn’t in such dire financial straits. Despite the political deadlock, the investors, most of them Belgiums, didn’t lose confidence in the bonds…