Breaking up is certainly not a joyous event for any political party, but sometimes it is inevitable. The woes currently experienced by the Independent Greek party have left us feeling disheartened. As it stands, or as presented to us by some of its former members, they gained votes by appealing to the part of Greeks by speaking to the basest parts of human nature. Was there any place for high mindedness or a campaign of integrity in our political landscape? No one knows, but the latest news has indeed upset us here at HellasFrappe, not because we politically supported this party, but we generally respect ideologies and not flip-flop politics, especially when they are with anti-national movements such as SYRIZA.
From what we read in the Greek press Kammenos currently struggling to keep his party together after some of its MPs forced him to flee a meeting on Monday when he refused to answer their questions over his hardline stance against working with their leftist rivals, SYRIZA, and accused him of “cowardly” behavior.
Kammenos, whose party is opposed to the international bailouts and the Memorandums had met with his MPs on Dec. 10 but was faced with a stream of questions on his stance with SYRIZA , as well as on the prospects of Greece leaving the Eurozone. According to these reports, Kammenos became so frustrated from all the questioning that he walked out of the room and when he sought to reconvene his MPs, in an apparent bid to limit the tension, the secretary of his parliamentary group, Costas Markopoulos, refused to do so, replacing him with Panayiotis Melas.
Fast forward to Tuesday morning and the statements made by Yiannis Manolis, a unionist who decided to abandon the New Democracy to join Panos Kammenos’s new right-wing anti-austerity Independent Greek party, who only added more fuel to the fire by charging Kammenos on SKAI radio of actually submitting the much-talked about and controversial document (non-paper) to President of the Republic Karolos Papoulias this last May despite the claims that the note had been forged.
At the time, Kammenos had stated that the document forwarded by Papoulias' office to other party leaders during the process of exploratory talks aimed at setting up a government had not been drafted by himself.
In short, Manolis boldly accused Kammenos of basically lying over a non-paper in which he proposed joining a coalition government (after elections in May) only as long as he was made Minister of Defense. “Kammenos gave the non-paper so he could secure the position of defense minister,” said Manolis. “His first mistake was to give the document, his second was to make the President out to be a liar.”
Following the statements, Kammenos ousted Manolis from the party.
The document, apparently originating from the office of Independent Greeks, stated that the party would support a unity government if it were matter of “national urgency.” The proposal was also reported to have said that Kammenos would agree to supporting a unity government on the condition that Independent Greeks be given the Defense Ministry among other posts, including positions on the board of any public company that would be responsible for managing Greece’s hydrocarbon resources. At the time, Kammenos had threatened to take legal action after claiming the document had been forged or had been submitted by associates without his knowledge.
Manolis also labelled Kammenos a “coward” for allegedly walking out on the party’s 20 MPs during a meeting on Monday.
“He doesn’t talk to anyone and he’s always talking about SYRIZA,” said Manolis. “It’s like he’s telling voters to support SYRIZA when there is a chasm that separates the two parties.”
The now former Independent Greek MP also accused Kammenos of constantly changing his positions and not consulting with anyone in the party.
Kathimerini said in one report that several of the party’s MPs were angry about Kammenos’s behavior on Monday but it is not clear if this will lead to them quitting the party, which was founded by its leader in February and won 7.5 percent of the vote in the June elections, which made it Greece's fourth largest party.
But some may have spoken too soon.
Later on Tuesday it became known that Christos Zois is also leaving the Independent Greek party.
Zois' resignation comes just hours after Manolis statements.
Following the resignation of the party's spokesman, Christos Zois earlier today a tsunami of press reports, comment war on twitter, the countless reports on the mainstream media and Greek radio between Kammenos and Manolis, another MP from the Independent Greek party decided to resign.
At around 7 in the evening Dimitris Stamatis, who was the acting Secretary of International Relations for the Independent Greek party told reporter Nikos Evangelatos on SKAI channel that he too submitted his resignation, and also revealed that he is withdrawing from the political scene in general. It is worth noting Stamatis was one of the closest associates of Antonis Samaras in the Political Spring party in the early 90s.
Stamatis said that he decided to resign for reasons of political and personal dignity.
Asked from Evangelatos about the accusations by Manolis earlier in the day, that claim Kammenos of lying about the non-paper that was given to Papoulias in Mat, Stamatis answered that if this were true he would never disclose such information.
Scanning various reports throughout the day, which were later confirmed by our sources, we here at HellasFrappe also fear that several more MPs will be submitting their resignations in the days to come.
References
iefimerida
kathimerini
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