The Greeks have to live with belt tightening and domination by the troika for however long it takes, and that may be a long and painful time, or default and return to the drachma and probably wind up out of the EU with all the perils that await them there. The middle road they have been coasting down the last half decade has run out. The game of cat and mouse has run its course. So has the poker game being played on both sides. You can only bluff for so long ... eventually the other side catches on.
Greece has been run by crooks and they have left huge debts while filling their own pockets. Books have been faked. What needs to be done is bring those that mismanaged Greece to trial and lock them up.
Below is an excellent article highlighting the crooks that ruined Greece. This is just a partial list - there are many more individuals responsible for Greece's financially destitute situation. I read this on Politico this morning and it is very interesting:
History shows that a long line of leaders helped make Greece
the economic basket case it is today.
By DAMIAN MAC CON ULADH 5/5/15, 6:00 AM CET Updated 5/5/15,
1:23 PM CET
As negotiations inch along between the Syriza government and
Greece’s international creditors, the blame for the nation’s looming financial
collapse would seem to rest entirely on the shoulders of Prime Minister Alex
Tsipras and Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis. But not really: History provides
ample evidence that a long line of leaders, from Winston Churchill to
Constantine II, helped make Greece the economic basket case it is today.
Here are some of the guiltiest culprits:
Konstantis and Georgios Mavromichalis (died 1831)
When Greek-born Ioannis Kapodistrias was appointed
independent Greece’s first governor in 1827, little did he realize that the job
would be tougher than his former post as Russia’s foreign minister. Accustomed
to working on the diplomatic stage, Kapodistrias soon found that his vision of
a modern Greek state was not shared by everyone, especially the provincial
elites.In 1831, he was stabbed in the stomach and shot in the head as he made
his way to church by Konstantis and Georgios Mavromichalis. The killing was
revenge for Kapodistrias’s jailing of their respective father and brother, the
warlord Petrobey Mavromichalis. His assassination plunged Greece into chaos,
leading the European powers to impose a foreign king, the young Bavarian prince
Otto, on the young country, giving it a first taste of German rule.
Winston Churchill (1874–1965)
In 1944, Greece’s leftist partisan movement managed to see
the backs of the German army after three and a half years of brutal wartime
occupation. Unbeknownst of them, British prime minister Winston Churchill and
Soviet leader Joseph Stalin had secretly divvied up eastern Europe and the
Balkans on a piece of paper, placing Greece within Britain’s sphere of
influence. While communist leaders also bear responsibility, Churchill’s
determination to restore the unpopular Greek monarchy, as well as his
determination to exclude former communist partisans from the new Greek army,
pushed Greece further down its calamitous path to civil war.
Constantine II (1940– )
Since Greece became a parliamentary republic in 1974, its
former king has had no role in political or public life, to almost universal
relief. Assuming the throne at the age of 23, Constantine caused enough damage
from 1964 to 1967. Soon, he found himself at loggerheads with the centrist
government, led by George Papandreou, who eventually resigned. Constantine then
sought to create amenable governments using centrist party defectors, which
fuelled a constitutional crisis and political instability that ultimately led
to the 1967 military coup.
Georgios Papadopoulos (1919–1999)
The weak state of Greek democracy was dealt a major blow in
1967 when a group of mid-level army officers, led by Colonel Georgios
Papadopoulos, staged a successful coup d’état. Seven years of dictatorship
followed, during which Papadopoulos himself was deposed in a coup by
hardliners. While Papadopoulos would later die in prison, his asinine medical
metaphors—he often likened himself to a doctor trying to cure a sick patient
(Greece)—were redeployed by advocates of taking a tough line on Greece when
crisis struck in 2009.
Andreas Papandreou (1919–1996)
Greece’s longest serving prime minister since the
restoration of democracy in 1974, Andreas Papandreou left an indelible mark on
Greek politics and its economy. Over the course of his decade in office
(1981–89, 1993–96), the Harvard-trained economist introduced long overdue
social and progressive reforms and stacked the civil service with his socialist
Pasok party supporters. While he elevated many Greeks to the middle class, that
success came at the heavy cost of drastically increasing the budget deficit and
public debt levels. As corruption scandals mounted in the late 1980s,
Papandreou created a sideshow by ditching his wife in favor of his airhostess
mistress.
Kostas Karamanlis (1956– )
Like many Greek prime ministers, Kostas Karamanlis became
leader of the county largely on the strength of his surname – his uncle was
prime minister and president at various stages from 1955 to 1995 – and because
he promised to “re-establish” the state.
But in his five year tenure (2004–2009), few reforms were enacted, and the
government lost control of Greece’s public finances. Had Karamanlis spent less
time in front of his Playstation, as is widely rumored, maybe things could have
been better. The rocketing budget deficit and debt-to-GDP ratio, which were
continuously revised upward during and after his rule, paved the way for the
next government to ask for a bailout.
George Papandreou (1952– )
Prime minister like his father and grandfather before him,
George Papandreou was elected in October 2009 using the vote-catching slogan
“there is money,” despite being aware of the county’s dire economic situation.
Unable to manage the ensuing fiscal crisis, Papandreou requested a €110 billion
bailout deal from European Union and International Monetary Fund six months
later. To the disbelief of most Greeks, the oblivious former leader attempted a
political comeback in the 2015 election, in which he campaigned on an
anti-austerity programme.
Akis Tsoschatzopoulos (1939– )
Greece would be in a far worse place today had former
interior minister Akis Tsochatzopoulos been successful in his bid to become
prime minister in 1996. Luckily, he only came within six votes of replacing
Andreas Papandreou as leader of the socialist Pasok party. In 2013, a court
sentenced Tsochatzopoulos, now 75, to life imprisonment for pocketing €55
million in kickbacks from military procurements from 1996 to 2001, when he was
defense minister. His wife, ex-wife, daughter, cousin, and business associates
were all implicated in the scandal, most of whom were also jailed.
Greek Oligarchs
With legacies extending back decades in cases, Greece’s
oligarchs have emerged relatively unscathed from the Greek crisis and continue
to control vast wealth, which is largely inherited but also derives from
continued interests in shipping, communications, banking, construction and
public works. This coterie of powerful Greek businessmen used political
connections with former conservative and socialist governments to win contracts
and restrict the Greek market. They also own and exert editorial control over
most, if not all, of the privately-held media companies, in a country where
public broadcasting remains largely under state control. The new Syriza-led government
has promised to rein in the oligarchs, but some things are easier said than
done.
Petros Kostopoulos (1954– )
Businessman and flamboyant publisher Petros Kostopoulos
gained fame during the media boom years in the 1990s. He introduced a series of
highly popular lifestyle magazines to Athens that sought to break taboos and
emulate urban fashions from more affluent western countries. The underlying
message in his publications and editorials was one of unbridled consumerism.
Cue the multiple credit cards, Cayenne Porsches, skiing holidays, extravagant
home loans, and private swimming pools. All these status symbols became more
attainable after Greece, one of the poorest countries in the European Union,
adopted the euro in 2001, which gave its banks easier access to cheap money.
Nikos Michaloliakos (1957– )
Relatively unknown until a few years ago, Nikos
Michaloliakos and his neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party have capitalized on the Greek
crisis to propel them to seats in the Greek and European parliaments. Appearing
immune from the police or the justice system, Golden Dawn gangs patrolled
inner-city streets, intimidating and sometimes beating migrants and political
opponents. Only after a Golden Dawn supporter fatally stabbed the anti-fascist
singer Pavlos Fyssas in 2013 did the state react by jailing Michaloliakos and
several other Golden Dawn leaders, who will soon go on trial on charges of
forming and running a criminal organization.
Troika
The troika – made up of the European Commission, European
Central Bank, and International Monetary Fund – bears a fair share of the blame
for Greece’s current state. The troika’s programs are based on over-optimistic
growth projections, which have led to a number of revisions to Greece’s debt
sustainability. Fiscal austerity has imposed a huge social cost upon the Greek
people, pushing people out of work and into poverty, and leaving hundreds of
thousands without access to public healthcare.
Damian Mac Con Uladh is a reporter for The Irish Times,
based in Athens. Follow him on Twitter @damomac.
