Papademos' government tenure might be prolonged

The timing of elections is the next area of political confrontation between parties supporting the government.

Already, Mr. Giorgos Karatzaferis stated yesterday that the government should be given time to complete its work. This leaves open the matter of what exactly the government’s work is. On a similar wavelength, in his speech to the House, Finance Minister Mr. Evangelos Venizelos spoke of elections after the first semester. But the PM said that the election date is indicative.

The ND party disagrees and argues that things are simple. “There is the framework of the agreement of political leaders under the President of the Republic”, stated party spokesman, Mr. Yiannis Michelakis.

This framework defines the mission of the government, which is to sign the loan agreement, make the PSI negotiations and call for elections”, he added, based on the fact that PASOK and ND’s delegations set February 19th as the date. Indeed, the ND team states that Venizelos and his colleagues knew of the roadmap that the PSI would need to follow when they agreed to that date.

“Yes” to a short extension, “no” to a great delay.

Of course, this process can be hindered by unforeseen circumstances. “Then, we will have a second look”, state ND officials and add that “there may be a delay of a few weeks until the process is complete”, but in no way will they accept a great delay as requested by Mr. Karatzaferis.

Behind the election date there are the different intentions of the parties. PASOK has every reason to want to postpone elections since with Papademos as PM, they have the most ministries. In parallel, their own party has been worn out by infighting due to the matter of leadership succession, which will take time. Thus, they have also nothing to fear from ND, who are now also being held accountable and their own anti-memorandum policy has been forgotten.

LAOS wants to participate as much as possible, after it claimed as many ministries as it could.

For ND, things are backwards. The more the life of the government is extended, the more the damage to the party increases and the more society thinks that “everyone is the same”. The Syngrou Boulevard executives want elections as soon as possible, in order to be able to remind people of their argument that government participation was only intended for the country to be able to stay in Europe and the for the loan to be secured. It adds that right afterwards, there can be elections and ND will be able to define the economic politics that will accompany the new agreement. They call on the IMF’s position since after Samaras’ letter, they stated that it is positive that the ND president agrees that whatever changes need to be implemented, they will be carried out within the pre-agreed framework. “The IMF recognizes that there can be amendments in policies, as we suggest”, state ND officials.

Finally, on the issue of elections, they state that other political forces must break the agreement of political leaders that the government requires. Many within the party are for prolonging elections. Their argument is that they should resolve all outstanding issues in a coalition government rather than inherit them and immediately make difficult decisions.