Paraskevas Avgerinos, a former PASOK Socialist leading figure, said he hoped that the fading party will not maintain the character of a “Papandreou party,” during an interview he gave on May 27 to the newspaper Ton Syntakton.
He said if George Papandreou was not the son of Andreas Papandreou, he would not have become neither the party’s leader nor the Prime Minister of Greece.
He stated that when the party was identified as “a Papandreou party,” it had a democratic structure, but it was connected to its leader, it was identified with its founder.” He added: “I don’t know if the party will remain as such, but I don’t think or hope so.”
Avgerinos commented that the PASOK of today has nothing to do with the old party and judged that this fact is both good and bad. He added that the party’s continuity is judged right now: “At this moment, Evangelos Venizelos needs to exist so that it will not be dissolved, there is nothing else.”
Concerning the prospect of creating a party coalition, such as The Olive Tree (L’ Ulivo) in Italy, as many in PASOK have suggested, Avgerinos stated that “without SYRIZA L’ Ulivo cannot exist,” saying that he has not yet understood what the leftist party wants and promises for the future.
Avgerinos referred to PASOK’s history and believes that “after 1981, a course of gradual decline followed for PASOK, which obliged to continual compromises.” He stressed out that today it is systematically attempted to blame PASOK for whatever is wrong. “Those who are below 50 years old do not know what there was in 1981 to appreciate what it became next,” he said.
PASOK won 44 percent of the vote in 2009 when Papandreou was elected but he was hounded out of office two years later by relentless protests, strikes and riots against austerity measures he imposed on the orders of international lenders, and continued support for pay cuts, tax hikes and slashed pensions by current PASOK leader Evangelos Venizelos, who is part of the coalition government of Prime Minister Antonis Samaras, the New Democracy Conservative leader, have pushed the Socialists to 5-7 percent support.
See all the latest news from Greece and the world at Greekreporter.com. Contact our newsroom to report an update or send your story, photos and videos. Follow GR on Google News and subscribe here to our daily email!
