George Papandreou’s reference to the announcement he made in 2011 for a referendum, which he was forced to take back, caused a sensation after the reactions that took place inside and outside of Greece.
“Too bad I didn’t insist on the referendum. We bear the heavy political burden,” said the former prime minister, speaking at a panel of the conference “Postcolonization: 50 years later” about the period of his administration.
However, he appeared confident that “our strategic decision to keep the country in the EMU and to do everything to prevent Greece from leaving the EMU was correct”.
“Others said to tear up the memorandums”
Mr. Papandreou underlined that in 2009, when there should have been unity, populism prevailed. Leaving hints about tearing up the memorandums, the former prime minister said that if we had served “truths, the memorandums would have been of much shorter duration.”
“When I took over we had a huge debt, but the worst thing was our unreliability due to the fraud with the statistics. In 2009 we told the truth,” he continued. “At the worst moment of the Post-colonialism, when there should have been a spirit of unity, that’s where I experienced populism. Others said to tear up the memoranda. We told the truths. If we had served them, the memoranda would have been much shorter.”
Mr. Papandreou even explained that he had called Antonis Samaras twice on the phone. “I had told him that I am willing to leave the chair because he had set that condition. I asked him to meet. I was picked up by my colleagues after ten minutes and told that the place was buzzing that I was resigning. Can one have a serious discussion and in ten minutes say “Papandreou is leaving”?
“I had asked Karamanlis for the real facts”
Also, the former prime minister returned to the issue of the data he received when he assumed the government of the country, saying that he had asked “Karamanlis to tell me the real data” about the economy.
“I had spoken to the person responsible for Greece at the IMF, who is of Indian origin. And he said that they had spoken to Mr. Alogoskoufis that the country would go bankrupt. In 2007, 2008, Mr. Alogoskoufis knew what was happening. And of course Mr. Papathanasiou”, he said.
“I was informed by Mr. Provopoulos ten days before the elections that “we are not doing well”. I had asked Mr. Karamanlis for the facts. He did not answer me”, noted Mr. Papandreou.
In this context, he estimated that the ND faction has a huge responsibility for what happened. “We were talking about the future of the country and we started with bad faith and undermining,” he said characteristically, while revealing that he had asked Kostas Karamanlis for the real data on the economy and he did not answer. “
Finally, on the current issue of non-state universities, he pointed out that “there must be a serious framework”. “This bill talks about foreign annexes. Why not give the same right, the same freedom, to public universities?” he wondered.
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