A speech was given by Thanos Tzimeros, a Greek politician and leader of Dimourghia Xana, at a public event that took place in Parliament on the 4th November 2015.
It addresses issues surrounding Greece, its present state and thoughts about a possible more positive future.
T. Tzimeros is a good talker and often manages to be humorous, caustic, and truthful in even doses in his addresses. In so doing he does not distort reality; and the few numbers included in his speeches are usually correct AFAIK.
It is not a bad text and it does give a reasonably accurate overview of why things are what they are in Greece and how they came to be as they are. And it is refreshingly short for a politician...
No further comments necessary.
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"Right Honourable Members of the British Parliament, dear all!
I thank you for the invitation and for granting me the opportunity to
analyze the causes that have driven my country, a country which in the
past inspired poets and philosophers, to inspire today only cartoonists
and presenters of satirical shows.
Greece is a country in deep
crisis, a crisis that is not only financial. I would dare to say that
the financial issue is the least of its problems. For the past 35 years,
Greece has been living through a continuous decline in ethics,
institutions, public life, education and the level of its leaders.
There is no precedent in World History where a government adopted as
its official state policy the blackmailing of its partners. This is
precisely what SYRIZA did during its seven-month "negotiation" with the
European Union - negotiation in quotation marks. And, let us not forget
that the EU partners had already given to a basically bankrupt state, an
enormous debt “haircut” and two bailout loan agreements with extremely
favourable terms, mostly at the expense of the European taxpayers.
It is clear that the SYRIZA government went to Brussels with the
following shocking message, a message which was its central platform
during the pre-election campaign period: "You lend us money, we spend
it. And, we intend to keep on spending in the exact same way that led us
into bankruptcy; on huge pensions for fifty-year olds and on salaries
for hundreds of thousands of redundant civil servants, many of whom with
a ghost job description. And, not only shall we not fire any persons
holding sinecure offices, but we shall hire even more civil servants and
create more early pensioners. We are not undertaking any commitments
for the new loans that we want you to give to us, and we demand that you
write off the old ones." Unbelievable!
According to the SYRIZA
propaganda in Greece, there was not even one in a million probability
that the European Union would turn down the demands of SYRIZA, because
the alternative of not lending to this Neo-Bolshevik Greek government
would be the collapse of the European Union, a much greater catastrophe
that the leaders of the European Union would certainly want to avoid!
I am ashamed for my country’s government. I am ashamed for its
politicians. I am ashamed of the image of Greece in the modern world. I
admire the composure and patience of the European governments that
continued to negotiate for 7 months with these blackmailers! However,
surprisingly, the SYRIZA won the national elections for a second time in
a row. What has happened? Have the Greeks gone mad?
No. Even for
the most irrational of behaviors there is always a rational
explanation. But one has to look at the entire picture. Please, allow me
a brief historical overview. It is essential in order to comprehend the
Greek Drama.
The rule of law was never really applied in Greece,
a country that did not go through the renaissance and the
enlightenment. The Ottoman occupation was succeeded by an Ottoman model
of governance, “Greek style”. The Greek State has always been a mixture
of guilds and interest groups, in conflict with each other. The core of
this model has always been state sponsored patronage. In Greece we call
it “clientelism”. The Greek citizens have been giving their vote to
those from whom they expected the greatest benefit.
The Greek
politicians, on the other hand, ensured their re-election by giving away
public money through the appointments to civil service positions, and
through the granting of pensions and allowances. Policies to benefit the
entire Greek population have never taken hold in Greece. The political
parties seized power by any and all means, lawful or not, in order to
look after their client sextion of the people and, of course, to put
their hands on the public money wich is taxpayers’ money, as the late
baroness Thatcher used to say.
Consequently, in the past, the
Greeks were divided because of conflicts of interest and not because of
substantial ideological differences. The ideological differences came
after the civil war. Under the pretext of the communist danger, the
rightist governments, who won the civil war, adopted practices of
legalized fascism, which divided the Greeks between “loyalists” and
“infected”. Infected were not only the communists, but also the
progressive thinking citizens. No person could occupy public office, get
higher education, or even marry a civil servant, unless they could
obtain a “certificate of political convictions”, granted by the police,
which certified that none of the person's family members had ever been
involved in any “anti-national activity”.
Given the fact that
this term is totally vague, it was at the discretion of the police
officer to determine how to classify a person and thus stigmatize him or
her for the rest of his or her life. This regime lasted until 1981,
leaving the civil war wounds open, and leading the post-war generations
to believe that anything to the "right" is fascist and regressive, while
anything to the "left" is synonymous with progress and humanism.
Then, came PASOK with Andreas Papandreou. By opening up the public
sector to the leftists, who up to that time had been excluded, he could
have led Greece to a national reconciliation. In addition, he happened
to come into power at the time when the then E.E.C had opened the tap of
financing. Thus, Andreas Papandreou also had the financial means to
build the necessary infrastructure and modernise the country, especially
its institutional framework.
He did exactly the opposite. He
fostered a new division, but this time it was the rightists that were
left out of the game, and all power went to Papandreou's partisans. In
the first year of his tenure, he increased the number of civil servants
from 121,000 to 208,000! By the time the crisis broke out, Greece had
nearly 1,100,000 civil servants, burdening the State with a cost of 31
billion Euros per year!
Andreas Papandreou created one more
industry of debt production and of "buying of consciences": pensions. He
was granting early retirement at full pension to literally everyone: to
32-year old mothers of minors, to 40-year old military officers, to
unmarried daughters of military officers or judges, to leaders of trade
unions, to repatriated Greeks from the ex-Soviet Union, to artists as a
prize for their work, and to anybody who had supposedly participated in
the resistance during the German occupation, including those born in
1933! 7 year old partisans!
The most outrageous benefits were
granted to the members of certain unions through the so-called
supplementary pension funds. In some cases, these union members, with
insurance contributions to the supplementary pension funds of less than
200 Euros in total, have received, up to date, nearly 200,000 Euros per
person in supplementary pensions! It was a good investment, don't you
agree? Between the year 2000 and today, Greek taxpayers have paid 200
billion Euros for pensions; which corresponds to almost two-thirds of
the Greek debt.
In the periods when New Democracy, the alleged
Greek conservative party, exercised power, it simply copied PASOK. The
two parties, thus, created a monstrous mechanism of clientelism, even
stronger than the position of the Prime Minister: The efforts of
Constantinos Mitsotakis of New Democracy and of Costas Simitis of PASOK,
both prime ministers, to implement some liberal reforms were undermined
and eventually reversed by their own parties, themselves!
The
clientelistic establishment that grossly inflated the ranks of the civil
servants also destroyed the quality of the services provided. The party
followers that were appointed were generally people without skills,
with minimal education, low intelligence and without any desire to work.
A note from a minister that Mr. Rakintzis, the Inspector of Public
Administration, discovered in the file of a newly hired civil servant,
is very telling. The politician wrote: “He is good for nothing. Just
place him somewhere”.
This partisanship has infiltrated
everything, and has removed any notion of meritocracy and personal
responsibility, eliminated any concept of benefit versus cost, and has
also transformed the simplest civil functions into indecipherable
riddles. Every time a citizen comes into contact with any part of the
state mechanism, he or she knows in advance that they will live through a
nightmare of absurdity, stupidity, legal chaos, bureaucratic sadism,
wasted time, wasted energy and wasted money. And it is even worse for
potential investors.
The parties nurtured state workers unions as
a mechanism to control the civil servants. But in doing so, they
actually fed a monster that has broken away and is devouring everything
in its path. When the union of civil servants goes on strike, the
country grinds to a hold. It is estimated that, over the last four
decades, the time lost due to strikes by the civil servants is more than
1500 working days! That is approximately 6 years’ worth of work!The
unions have imposed an unprecedented regime where there is a complete
absence of any control and complete impunity for their union members.
Civil servants that have been sentenced for embezzlement of tens of
millions of Euros, or even for murder, continue to be paid and keep
their posts in the civil service, as if nothing had happened! The heads
of the state workers unions are, by law, exempt from work. They cannot
be fired, they receive a special union pension, they are illegally
financed by the state with hundrends of millions of Euros, with no proof
required for their expenses.
So, the Greeks have learnt to
survive within a state that is hostile to them, that steals from them,
does not fulfil its obligations, and does not honour its agreements. The
state entraps its citizens taxes, retroactively, and constantly changes
the rules of the game. The Greeks have learnt to operate within a
non-existent institutional framework, where there are no checks and
balances or separation of powers, where the justice system operates
under the thumb of the executive branch, where it takes up to 30 years
to reach a court judgement, where most operating regulations are not
through laws voted in the parliament, but through decrees issued by each
Minister depending on his personal political interests. It is telling
that out of the 110.000 regulatory provisions of the last 15 years, a
mere 2% have actually been voted in parliament.
Often it is
impossible to sort out what to do because of the existence of
contradictory laws for the same issue. Evidently, in no way does Greece
resemble a western state operating under the rule of law. Thus, in the
elections, citizens punish one party by voting for the other, if they
don’t abstain altogether, disgusted with the political system as a
whole.
This decadence has gradually driven almost all capable
people away from politics and, certainly anyone who would be able to
reform this state-monster. There have been many examples of worthy,
honest, and innovative politicians during these past years, but their
own political parties pushed them to the margins, or away from politics
altogether.
Most Greeks actually want this model changed. I
remember when the troika appeared for the first time, I was in a taxi
when I heard the news of the arrival of the troika on the radio. The
driver, a simple guy, also heard it, and told me: “Can they stay here
forever? Can they get into the ministries, and clean up the deadwood? It
is the only way for us to become a real state!”
But this did not
happen. Unfortunately, in my opinion, two criminal mistakes were made.
The first was made by the Greek political system. First Mr. Samaras,
then Mr. Tsipras, discovered the charm of the “revolution” against the
bailout agreements. Instead of explaining to the citizens, in every
detail, the real causes for the Greek bankruptcy, and instead of
supporting the reforms that are necessary for the survival of the
country, they fabricated the myth that the evil foreigners want to
impoverish us, whilst at the same time they pretend to battle for the
salvation of the Greeks. And, in order to preserve the privileges of
their clients, they chose to overtax the private sector, forcing over
400.000 Greek companies to close or to relocate, and driving two million
Greeks into unemployment, underemployment, or emigration.
The
other big mistake was made by the Troika: Even though they were fully
aware that the politicians they were dealing with were completely
unreliable, they did not demand during the application of the first two
bailout agreements that reforms must be made before the money is given.
In fact, the Troika should have implemented what I had suggested, back
in 2011, in my - very well known in Greece - letter to Chancellor
Merkel: “Small installments against specific reforms, step by step. Not
all the money at once!”
The governments of George Papandreou and
Antonis Samaras voted for the laws of the bailout, took the money, and
then voted other laws that annulled the first laws, or simply did not
enforce them.
The data pertaining to the pension system are
revealing. Even in the middle of the crisis, there are still 200
different pension funds and 40 legal loopholes for early retirement.
Even today, one-third of the civil servants retire before the age of 55,
with an average retirement age of 56.3 years. 91% of the retirements
from the so-called "noble" funds are early. We pay 4.7 billion Euros per
year to pensioners below 60 years of age. And, 417,000 people are
receiving from 3 to 10 pensions each!
Despite being aware of
these facts, the Troika accepted and continues to accept the criminal
logic of allowing equivalent measures instead, which means new taxes in
order to finance old privileges.
At the January national
elections, the Greek people voted for the SYRIZA party because Mr.
Tsipras promised tax relief and the end of austerity. At the same time,
Mr. Tsipras promised new benefits and the hiring of hundreds of
thousands of additional civil servants. Obviously, these were promises
that could not be kept. But the Greek voters had to choose between slow
death in the hands of the indecisive and ineffective New Democracy and
PASOK or the unknown SYRIZA, that campaigned with false promises under
the mask of humanitarianism. The people chose the unknown, longing for a
change for the better.
While SYRIZA has won two consecutive
elections this year, its populist leadership faces a daily painful
humiliation, since they are forced to recant on all their pre-election
promises. At the same time, New Democracy is forced, for the first time
in its history, to face the question of its ideological identity, and
there is even a possibility that it will elect a reformer as president
of the party. This is of great interest to us because most of our voters
are trapped in the polarization that the Greek political system has
created, and many of them vote for New Democracy hoping that the
Neo-Stalinists of SYRIZA will be defeated and that New Democracy may
change its nature.
We, Dimiourgia Xana, are consistent in our
pro-European orientation and radical reform agenda. We believe that the
European Union is at a critical juncture in its history, since it is
becoming necessary to transfer vital responsibilities from the sovereign
member states to a central government. It is an extremely complex step,
which we could discuss for days. But it is we, the citizens of Europe,
and no one else, who have to attempt it, because, if we do not, no
single European country alone will be able to play a leading role in the
world of tomorrow.
However, the imperfect European structure is
not in any way an excuse for the Greek problem. The debt of our country
is 100% a Greek achievement, and we must be responsible for the
repayment of every cent of it. And, we are the ones responsible for
eliminating the mechanism that is creating the debt, because even if the
entire debt were written off today, the corrupt system of governance
would create the debt all over again.
The reform of our country
is our obligation. It can only be done by politicians and technocrats
who are not calculating the political cost and are willing to clash with
vested interests.
Are there the necessary human resources to
achieve this? Of course there are, but you are not seeing them in the
news. Greece is full of intelligent, honest, energetic, innovative,
productive, decent Greeks, who excel anywhere in the world, when they
find an environment where the rule of law and meritocracy apply. Even in
Greece, despite the enormous difficulties, there are people who work
hard and produce wealth. There are also many competent and honest public
servants at every level of the hierarchy that wish to work in an
environment of transparent rules and the enforcement of the laws.
The healthy Greece exists everywhere, it exists among the Greeks of the
diaspora, it exists in this room, and it exists in the last Greek
village. Greece is favoured by nature. It has abundant natural
resources, history, culture. In the same way that we excel in the
shipping industry, we can excel in all types of business, in academia
and in research. If an open-minded government were in power, which would
encourage enterprise and innovation, Greece would be galloping.
We
ask for your help to accomplish that. Not by giving us new loans, but
by supporting reformist voices like ours, those voices that the Greek
political system is silencing. It is a matter of time for the
Neo-Bolsheviks of SYRIZA to collapse, especially if the European
partners stick to their guns and force the Greek Government to reduce
the size and waste of the State. This can only be done by shutting down
useless public institutions and laying off their staff. Then, we will
have a lot of work to do to rebuild Greece from the ground up. It is a
big challenge, but we can do it! There are many Greeks like us that have
sworn to our children to deliver to them a modern European country,
productive, civilized, proud and worthy of its history. We are
determined to succeed, no matter how much we will have to fight."
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A small point: one can always hope, hope dies last. Meanwhile, why not check the flights out of the country while the border is still open; the "neo-bolsheviks", as Mr Tzimeros refers to the present ruling party in Greece, have shown clear authoritarian (neo-fascist?) inclinations...
