According to Greek press reports, it looks like former finance minister George Papakostantinou (under the G.Papandreou government) is going to face the Special Court whether he likes it or not. The evidence against him in two very controversial scandals is apparently mounting and despite the protection he seems to be enjoying by foreign "dark" circles (such as the Bilderberg group which this year invited him for their annual conference, even though he has no official position in government anymore), Papakostantinou will not be able to escape the Greek justice system which is finally and heroically doing its job.
According to the same reports, he is pulling up a sweat over two cases and it is expected that following the June 17 elections, these two cases will literally push him against the wall and he might just face the same fate as former PASOK cadre Akis Tsochatzopoulos did who is now being held at Korydallos prison and waiting for his trial.
The first case, as some may recall, involves the allegations over the falsification of the Greek deficit (and ELSTAT -the Greek Statistics Authority).
Late last year Professor at the University of Macedonia and former committee member of ELSTAT Zoe Georganta, outwardly accused Papakonstantinou of purposely “falsifying” Greece’s deficit in 2009, and said that the methods used for calculating the deficit were in conflict with Eurostat practices. In previous articles here on hellasfrappe we had quoted Georganta as saying that the Greek deficit for 2009 was deliberately estimated at 15.4%. She had said that the deficit was artificially inflated in 2009 to show that the country had the largest across Europe, including that of Ireland which was 14% in order to justify the severe measures the government wanted to impose on the country. And (that is why) Eurostat presented it at 15,4%“.
Indeed, a new figure emerged after PASOK came to power in November 2009, leading to panic on the markets, unsustainable high borrowing costs for Greece and, ultimately, the creation of the country’s emergency loan package.
New Democracy and the Communist Party boycotted the committee which supposedly probed this case in parliament but this did not deter its members, who sent letters to former EU Economic Affairs Commissioner Joaquin Almunia and the director-general of the EU’s statistics agency, Eurostat, Walter Radermacher, to ask them to give evidence as part of the probe.
The second case involves the scandalous CDS bonds of TT bank. Leader of the independent Greeks party Panos Kammenos has said that George Papakostantinou and other members of his circle presided over the sale of a 1.3 billion dollar credit default swap contract (CDS on Greek sovereign debt) in December 2009, just a little after PASOK came into power after toppling conservative premier Costas Karamanlis.
The 1.3 billion US worth of insurance was at the time protecting against a Greek default and was bought during the spring and summer of the same year, by the state Hellenic Postbank (TT Bank). Today, this insurance is worth more than 26 billion Euros which is a significant amount to put against spiraling debt management. But the government is no longer in possession of this CDS because it was sold for a minimal profit just after it was purchased.
According to reports, a Swiss-based wealth-mamagement company that was set up in the same year titled IJ Partners apparently bought the insurance. So what was once public money now mysteriously became private money and there are some disturbing names among the officers and clients of IJ Partners.
The firm, based in Geneva, has a number of well-known Greeks serving as either managing partners or members of the board, including former IMF economist Miranda Xafa (who intermediated Greece’s dealings with the IMF) – a former CEO of Piraeus Bank….one of the banks named in a law suit for secretly shorting Greek state bonds during the same period, oh... and Theodore Margellos, who was accused of falsely baptizing imported corn from Yugoslavia as Greek produce in order to absorb state subsidies back in the late 80s under the Andreas Papandreou government.
Then we also have IJ’s Vice President, Mr. Jose-Maria-Figueres, who shares board membership of a separate private company with the Prime Minister’s own brother Andreas Papandreou Jr.
(It does not take a rocket scientist to put two and two together.)
Both cases are currently being investigated by Greek authorities and the evidence is mounting. The CDS scandal was initially being investigated by finance prosecutor Mr. Peponis who was unfortunately characterised as being "dreamer" (or in simple words a conspiracy fan) when he openly said that he was being pressured to close the case.
Editor's Note - Our opinion: When you play with fire... sooner or later you will get burned.
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defencenet
(Search hellasfrappe for more on the CDS and ELSTAT scandals by typing in CDS Papakostantinou Papandreou. Or ELSTAT Papakostantinou Papandreou.)
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