The late George Papandreou, grandfather of the present politician, was proved a tragic prophet. He said of his son Andreas: Alas if Andreas ever rules this Country! He will destroy it. This happened in 1981-1989. In a targeted and methodical way, he corrupted the Greek people, convincing them that they may live lavishly without labour, at the expense of the State Leviathan, either as idle civil servants or as swindlers of public funds. The slogan of his son “there is money” was long before made common practice by the father, hypothecating Greece’s future with immense international borrowing so that he could give out salaries and procreate scandals.
Foreigners had got wind of this very early.
Foreign Office secret files, recently released, contain an interesting brief for Madame Thatcher, on the occasion of her official visit to Athens on 22-24 September 1980. It portrays prominent political personalities of that time. The entry for Andreas Papandreou, referring to the period before the junta ends in the following phrase: “An incompetent and opportunistic Minister”.
It is common knowledge that this man is our Prime Minister’s ideal. In his speech he even imitates his accent. His problem is that he cannot fulfil this aspiration because he has neither Andreas’s education nor his talent (no matter how destructive this was).
His last episode in this mimicking is his participation in the funeral of Fidel Castro. He will be the only leader from the western world, who will be there. All this at a time, when the terminal negotiations for the second evaluation of the Greek programme continue, with many crucial fronts open and Erdogan threatens daily Greece and Cyprus in the cauldron of Middle East. The termination of the negotiations is a pre-requisite for the opening of the discussion on the relief of the Greek debt, which is a dear objective of Mr. Tsipras.
The sequence of priorities selected by the Prime Minister is tragic at least. His participation in Fidel’s funeral is bound to anger all other leaders, who have decided not to go. It is possible, the negotiations may fail and more austerity measures could be demanded by the troika? Participating in Castro’s mourning is apparently a priority for the Prime Minister. The additional impoverishment of the Greek people does not count in the eyes of Mr. Tsipras as highly as the dictates of his Marxist fixations.
Should we take Fidel’s “loss” equally seriously, we must wonder: Is the perpetuation of the degradation of the Greek people, in the eyes of Mr. Tsipras, as it was in Fidel’s, a means of securing the permanence of the government of the Left? Or is it simply the unavoidable outcome of every Marxist government?
This is a dubious explanation of the trip to Cuba, in the midst of a critical evaluation and so many international threats. On the other hand, we should not forget Tsipras’s mentor. Only, in this case, due to the difference in the calibre of Andreas and Alexis, the destruction of the Greek people will be greater, perhaps terminal.
By Maximos.