“I place my candidacy at the discretion of the national council”

“Christos, be strong and always be in the left-wing”. With this call, the young members of the PASOK group received Christos Papoutsis to the podium. “We obviously want to be competitive, but where is it written that this can happen through salary cuts?” he enquired, and wondered about state reconstruction. He described the PSI as a new breath, highlighting the ongoing efforts that George Papandreou has been making for two years, and the efforts that Evangelos Venizelos has made for many months,but which have not been enough to get the country out of the crisis.  He reiterated his 2009 position on a “rekindling” of the economy and set a further parameter: political stability.

Christos Papoutsis refused to separate the reformers from the populists and stated that the future of PASOK does not pertain to personal agendas, but to the future and the perspective of the people. PASOK must be the place of gathering for the political centre, as well as for the left-wing, he stated, setting this as his goal. Within this context, he distanced himself from disciplinary actions in the House and the compromises of the past. An indirect reference was made to those quitting the party and planning a new one. The battle must be fought within PASOK, was his message towards them.

He said yes to reforms, but only for the benefit of the people and not markets or bankers. In this context, he also spoke of a reduction in installments of loans and salary cuts.

Christos Papoutsis also said that he does not want PASOK to become the crutch of center-right-wing scenarios of co-governing, and asked George Papandreou to re-examine the decision to expel MPs who downvoted Memorandum 2, and caused a sensation when he stated that he will not stand for a PASOK ruled by barons any more.

“I place my candidacy at the discretion of the national council”, he said, asking essentially for a political decision to circumvent the process of signatures.