Coalition gov't wins confidence vote

Early on Wednesday and following a two-day debate on the government's policy statement, the SYRIZA-ANEL government won the roll-call vote, 162-137, in the 300-member Parliament.

Addressing parliament, Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras attacked Greece's EU partners, saying that it is “little Greece” that is carrying the torch of true European values against those who cultivate destabilization and, in the end, euroskepticism.

    “As long as we have the people on our sight, we are not blackmailed and we are not frightened by anybody,” Tsipras said.

Tsipras said that, in the space of a few days, his government had succeeded in turning Greece’s debt problem into a global issue. He emphasized that the bailout deal which kept Greece from defaulting is now dead by the will of the people.

     “We are only negotiating a credit agreement,” he said.

Greece was the laboratory to try neoliberal policies and “turn the Europe of the Enlightenment (back into the) social and labor Middle Ages, Tsipras added. What Greece asks is for this agreement to stop depending on “punishing” conditions that keeps the country into a vicious circle of austerity and recession.

     “We do not want to burden European taxpayers with our debt,” Tsipras said, adding that Greece needed growth to be able to pay back the debt and avoid bankruptcy. A bankrupt Greece means that creditors will lose their money.
     “We have a mutual interest” in this not happening, he said. A debt write-off “is merely a political decision, nothing else.” Creditors want to perpetuate the debt because they see it as the instrument to impose austerity. Tsipras warned the creditors that a Greek exit from the Eurozone will “be the end of Europe as we know it.”
     “This government cannot find itself on the ropes before it has even taken over…we need space and time…with a short-term agreement that will allow us to fulfill our obligations until a new agreement (promote growth) is signed,” said Tsipras.

International media that do not support these proposals represent certain interests, Tsipras claimed.

The Greek government wants the creditors to return the profits on the Greek bonds they hold, to allow Greece to use the funds in the Financial Stability Fund to write-off bad loans and to raise the limit for bond and T-bill issuance.

Tsipras equated privatizations to fire sales and pledged they will stop. “We recognize that private investments are crucial, but… our model sees the need for them to be combined with public investments and a certain social model.”

Finally, Tsipras said that the first law his government will table will protect peoples’ main homes from auctions and will provide relief to defaulting borrowers. The second will contain measures to protect the needy.

     “I am certain we will find a mutual agreement with our European partners, because I cannot believe there are forces in Europe that want to lead a country to humiliation and abasement, that want o inflict revenge and punishment on a people. Such choice will only lead to an impasse and we have lived fore, in Europe, the consequences of such an impasse,” Tsipras said, invoking the write-off of Germany’s debt in 1953 as an example of European values and will to overcome such an impasse.

On his part, main opposition New Democracy leader Antonis Samaras launched a fierce attack against Tsipras' government claiming that his former government's policies were successful and most of the policies layed out by the Tsipras government were already resolved by his own.

Whoever loves his country wants the new government to succeed. But we won’t allow you to jeopardize the country’s future and its European path," Antonis Samaras told MPs. He then expressed his fear that the country is entering the stranglehold of economic isolation.

The leader of ND accused SYRIZA of not having a program and that despite finding strong foundations by the government of New Democracy, it is now placing Greece in great danger.

He did note, however, that ND will support every policy which is in the right direction but will not let the country be destroyed.

     “You are lecturing us on debt negotiations. You are abandoning the sure path and you chase chimeras,” Samaras said, adding that while SYRIZA voted against everything when it was in the opposition, now that it is in government it states that 70 pct of these reforms were correct. 

Samaras elicited the smiles of several MPs when he commented on the government’s proposal to its lenders for perpetual government bonds: “Wow!” he exclaimed, borrowing the word from Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis.

He continued by saying his party will not undermine the government, like SYRIZA did in every chance it got, but wondered if they are considering holding a referendum, saying that “it took us a year to dispel the ghost of the drachma, when George Papandreou mentioned a referendum.”

Samaras also noted that a significant chunk of the population wants answers on how Greece will remain in the euro if we don’t repay our obligations.

     “You invited us to support you. We will do it. As long as your compass isn’t pointing at the rocks. There is something worse than a U-turn. Crashing the country against the rocks,” he said.