Greece: A dangerous government, clinging to power by any means

The New Democracy government, under the leadership of Kyriakos Mitsotakis, prominent leader of the ultra-neoliberal faction of the right-wing party, is facing the most serious political crisis since it came to power after the defeat of SYRIZA in the elections of 2019.

The revelations about the National Intelligence Service (EYP) phone-tapping political opponents of the government as well as independent journalists by invoking “national security” reasons is a big political scandal. There is no doubt it will have serious political consequences.

At the bottom of this scandal, there is a policy of… privatization in the hard core of the bourgeois state, the one operating on the field of “counter-terrorism” and espionage, which is the traditional domain of the notorious EYP, an opaque state service which enjoyed rich funding and total “protection” by all governments –including SYRIZA– in Greece.

The policy of privatization came to the spotlight having two dimensions.

On the one hand, there is the cooperation between the state and the private sector, with “security” enterprises that provide illegal and uncontrollable spyware. On the other hand, this obscure mechanism of surveillance and tracking data and activities (which provides obvious opportunities for blackmail) was placed under the direct control of Kyriakos Mitsotakis and his entourage, without even the pretext that this activity is organized for the benefit of the socio-political regime as a whole.

After coming to power, Mitsotakis placed the control of EYP directly under the Prime Minister’s Office. He appointed Panagiotis Kontoleon as head of the EYP, a man of the market who has a background in security companies. In doing so, he broke with a long tradition where the head of the EYP is always a distinguished “statesman”, usually a career diplomat or an officer. In addition, Mitsotakis assigned the “coordination” of the Prime Minister’s Office (which now included the political direction of EYP) to his… nephew, Grigoris Dimitriadis. He is a young wolf of the market, who had already proven himself as “flexible and efficient” in past scandals and scams (especially in the energy sector).

The officially approved phone-tappings rose to the unprecedented figure of 15-17,000 per year, always for “national security” reasons. We should keep in mind that the actual figure is much higher, since EYP maintains the privilege to decide whether they want to track all the interlocutors of each “suspect” whose surveillance was “authorized”. All those people found themselves (for reasons of “national security”) in a dark place, where there are no democratic rights or constitutional guarantees. In the process of surveillances, a specific “hub” in EYP used the Predator spyware, which is provided for hire by Intellexa, an Israeli surveillance firm. It is no coincidence that Intellexa is rumored to have financial links with the prime minister’s nephew and coordinator of the government, the young lawyer Mr. Dimitriadis!

The first crack in this sinister structure emerged when it was proven that EYP had installed the Predator spyware in the mobile phone of a journalist, Thanasis Koukakis, who was investigating financial scandals of the previous period (including a law by the Mitsotakis government that “released” certain big bank accounts which were previously “blocked” as suspects for money laundering). The crack became a rift when it was proven that EYP had wire-tapped the mobile phone of MEP Nikos Androulakis, while he was running for the leadership of PASOK.

Androulakis comfortably won the party election and is the current leader of PASOK mostly because (unlike his rival Andreas Loverdos) he refused to commit on forming a coalition with Mitsotakis in case New Democracy needed parliamentary support to rule after the next election. The motive for a potential political blackmail of Androulakis is more than obvious.

In the political storm that followed the revelations, even the extremely pro-government publications could no longer provide cover for Mitsotakis. “Kathimerini” (a paper owned by ship-owner Alafouzos) revealed that there are at least 7-8 more political opponents of Mitsotakis who are under surveillance. Christos Spirtzis (former minister and a right-hand man of Alexis Tsipras) has already said that Predator spyware was installed in his mobile phone. “To Vima” (a paper owned by ship-owner V. Marinakis) revealed that Intellexa is providing the Predator spyware for rent to more than 30 customers in Greece, beyond EYP and other state authorities. So it seems that business groups, banks, funds and others are engaged in the sport of illegal surveillance (the cost to rent Predator or other spyware is said to be 8 million Euros per “target”…).

Under the weight of these revelations, Mitsotakis was forced to ask for the resignations of Kontoleon and Dimitriadis, blaming them for “operational misfires”. But in the parliamentary debate, he tried to protect the vested potential for surveillance, defend the activities of EYP and block any further investigations by invoking the “classified” character of counter-terrorism and espionage operations. His sister, Dora Bakoyannis, has publicly warned all those involved to keep their mouth shut, declaring that whoever breaches the security of “classified” information faces 10 years in prison. To justify this outrage, Mitsotakis is painting a picture of Greece in a state of war: he constantly refers to the threat of immigrant/refugee “invasions” and to some sort of “hybrid” threats coming from Turkey. Yet again it is proven that racism and nationalism are a menace for the democratic rights of the majority in society.

For everyone understands that if Mitsotakis won’t hesitate to cross every line against the head of a mainstream party of power like PASOK, then what could be left standing from the rights of militant unionists, social movement activists, organized members of the political Left?

The failure of the government to present a convincing case for itself in the face of the surveillance scandal, has brought to the spotlight the difficulties that Mitsotakis is facing even in his own party, and mostly in his effort to remain the head of a wider “anti-Left” block which was formed in Greece during the struggles of 2010-15 (we could roughly describe it as the political block that represented the “YES” vote in the referendum of 2015). Former Prime Minister and ex-leader of New Democracy Kostas Karamanlis is a member of the powerful family that traditionally leads a fraction of the party known as “popular Right”. Ever since Mitsotakis was elected as party leader, Karamanlis opted for the tactic of remaining completely silent. He recently reversed this tactic for the first time, asking for the full investigation of the scandal and warning that it is not politically acceptable to invoke the “classified” nature of security service operations as a means to bypass parliamentary control and constitutional procedures.

This was also the political argument of former social-democrats who represent the “extreme center” in Greece, like Evaggelos Venizelos, Anna Diamantopoulou, N. Alivizatos etc. Ever since 2013, this political milieu had been a valuable ally for the right-wing party and a useful “reserve” for Mitsotakis in anticipation of the tough electoral contest in Spring of 2023.

Important as it is on its own right, the surveillance scandal is not enough to explain these shifts, which might seem to have a molecular character for now, but they threaten the cohesion of the political current that enabled the electoral victory of the Right in 2019. The scandal is also not enough to explain the obvious shifts on the treatment of Mitsotakis at an international level: Major international publications and media support the revelations and the further investigation, while New Democracy politicians are under serious pressure in the institutions of the EU.

On the bottom of these developments lies the failure of the economic/social policy of Mitsotakis which is leading to a potential new deep social/political crisis in Greece.

Speaking at the International Fair in Thessaloniki, Mitsotakis chose to remind the ruling class how dedicated he was in serving their interests: He reduced the taxation on profits to a minimum, he drastically cut the employers’ social security contributions, he eliminated any control or taxation to the inheritance transfer of large fortunes, and most importantly he insisted on the flexibilisation of industrial relations and the reactionary reform of labor laws to make strike action and union organization harder. This policy produced certain results: Despite the troubles in the international economy, companies listed on the stock exchange claim important profits, the exports of Greek capitalism are breaking record after record, the income from tourism remain on very high levels, while Greek ship-owners see the war in Ukraine providing them with new great opportunities (both legal and not-so-legal…) to transfer both American LNG and Russian oil.

But on the other side of the society, the situation is full of despair. According to union estimates, during 2022 the average wage of a full-time worker lost 19,2% of its purchasing power. Moving lower down the income ladder, where people have to spend all their income to cover for immediate needs, the impact of inflation is even harsher: the average wage of a part-time worker lost 30% of its purchasing power in 2022. In Greece, 30% of working-class households spend 45% of their monthly income to sustain a place to live (rent and utilities bills).

This extreme escalation of social inequality is a political concern that can be seen even among conservative circles of the establishment. The forecast that wide governmental coalitions will be needed in order to organize a wider social consensus is becoming more prominent on the mainstream Press.

This climate of political concerns inside the country is combined with a certain level of European discomfort: European “solidarity” funds are provided to Greece in order to use them to support the overall interests of the system as a whole. It is not easy for the EU Commission and its institutions to sit and watch in silence as the clique around Mitsotakis organizes a “party” of one-sided distributions that benefit solely the prime minister’s cronies.

For the time being, the leadership of New Democracy maintains the control of the political situation, choosing to organize an election towards the end of the 4-year mandate of Mitsotakis, in the spring of 2023. But no one can be sure that by then Mitsotakis will be in a better position, or even that his government will last until then. Because everyone knows that a tough winter is coming.

The opinion polls that were published after the surveillance scandal, warn about the risk of a political deadlock in the election of 2023. Their main findings can be summarized as such:

a)The prospect of a parliamentary majority for New Democracy is no longer feasible. The prospect of a governmental coalition between ND and PASOK does exist in terms of the needed numbers, but it is no longer politically viable, after the breakdown in the relations of Mitsotakis with the current leadership of PASOK and also with other social-democratic politicians, who had until recently been more “willing”, like Evag. Venizelos.

b)The alternative prospect of a coalition between SYRIZA and PASOK does exist in terms of electoral numbers, but still faces some important political problems. The statement of Nikos Androulakis that his aim is the formation of a government under “Neither Mitsotakis – Nor Tsipras” is an indication.

c)The remaining prospects, either of a Grand Coalition (ND-SYRIZA) or a technocratic government, or through changes in the major political parties with the emergence of “new and unscathed leaderships” still remain nebulous ideas, without concrete steps already taken to that direction.

This picture of the political situation, without a clear answer to the central question of governmental power in the next 6-9 months, is a sign of the political instability that emerges and which could be accelerated as the surveillance scandal unfolds.

Bottom line, the hopes of Mitsotakis to eventually retain control of the political game rest on the impressive weakness of the opposition and especially SYRIZA.

The position of Alexis Tsipras is undermined by the deeds of his government in 2015-19. The data about the activities of EYP (which had to become public at this point of the scandal) display that the first jump upwards in the number of phone-tappings took place in 2016, when Tsipras had to deal with imposing the Third Memorandum and the recent split in SYRIZA. In addition, the negotiations between the Greek State and Intellexa -which brought Predator spyware to the country- started in 2016, thus paving the way for the current outrages by mr.Dimitriadis and his friends. But the position of Tsipras is even more undermined by the political strategy he chose for SYRIZA, a strategy which is totally “institutional”, adjusted to the needs to ally with the social-democratic party and the prospect of a “progressive” government, that is a strategy which revolves solely around elections.

While Mitsotakis was speaking in Thessaloniki, Tsipras was a speaker to the annual festival of SYRIZA’s Youth, thus addressing the most radical audience left in this party. The only thing he chose to say to the young people in the party ranks was a call to… vote, whenever elections happen.

This policy provides Mitsotakis the potential to fightback. But most importantly, it provides the establishment the opportunities to move the political axis in a conservative direction, in their search for an electoral/governmental alternative solution after the election.

Facing a rough winter, the crucial question is whether the working-class movement and the youth will find the strength for their own independent massive intervention from bellow. This will determine the fortunes of their demands in the face of the crisis, but it will also have an important impact in the political situation.

Translated by Panos Petrou