State in danger of “call barring”

The example of the political leadership of the Education ministry, who were left without mobile phones after the mobile operator's decision to terminate the connections of ministers, is recent as large bills had accumulated and were not being paid.

But the bad debtors of the State are not confined to the Education ministry, as they expand to hundreds of State bodies.

According to data from the erstwhile public mobile operator, which is the main provider of the state machinery, the unpaid accounts reach 1 million euros.

At the top of the debt list lies the Environment and Climate Change ministry, of which the mobile phone debts of the political leadership and service agents have hit red. If the Court does not approve the payment of outstanding accounts, very soon George Papakonstantinou and his staff at the ministry will find themselves without mobile phones.

Apart from some ministries using mobile phones for several months without paying, there are hundreds of local government offices with unpaid bills of tens of thousands of euros each.

In the cases of Municipalities, the mobile operator is determined to proceed directly to blocking the lines. Characteristic of the prevailing mess in local government is the fact that in many municipalities people who were mayors or councilors four years ago still use state mobile phones.

But since the total debt of the entities of the public sector exceeded 1 million euros, the mobile phone company decided to enforce the rules that apply to all citizens of this country and cut off the lines of the non-payers.