Troika Back In Athens, Firings Seen Next

Inspectors from international lenders are due back in Athens on June 4 to check Greece’s books again in the ongoing progress of reviewing the pace of reforms, and the focus will reportedly be on the stalled issue of firing public workers.
The newspaper Kathimerini reported that the government wants more time – as it has said previously – before deciding how to figure out who will be fired, and as some critics fear it won’t be impartial.
The sackings will include people let go as dozens of public agencies are closed or merged, although Prime Minister Antonis Samaras has previously said he doesn’t want to fire anyone and would just move people from one agency to another.
The government though has pledged to reduce the workforce by 4,000 by the end of the year, not including retirements and attrition, but is seen as keen to avoid confrontations with labor unions with the tourist season beginning to get into full bloom, fearing a repeat of last year’s images of protests and riots that kept frightened visitors away.
The Administrative Reform Ministry will have to hand over to the envoys from the Troika of the European Union-International Monetary Fund-European Central Bank (EU-IMF-ECB) details of the process to sack civil servants accused and then convicted of offenses such as breach of faith, accepting bribes, and not showing up to work. It is estimated that hundreds of these public servants will be among the 15,000 that have to be fired by next year.
Kathimerini said that the figures so far show that between July 2012 and March this year, only 99 civil servants have been fired. However, the data also show that inspections for corruption and other offenses in the public sector have been stepped up.
Since last year, criminal charges have been leveled against 500 civil servants. This is almost equal to the number of bureaucrats that were charged between 2007 and 2011, when 540 were ordered to face disciplinary panels. Another 2,127 cases are currently being heard.
Among the other issues to be addressed by Greece and the troika inspection teams are tax collection, whether to reduce the Value Added Tax (VAT) in the food service sector as the government wants, and the privatization program.
The issue of reducing the 23 percent VAT rate in catering was brought up on June 3 in a meeting between Finance Minister Yannis Stournaras and European Commissioner for Taxation Algirdas Semeta when the pair met in Athens. The official from Brussels was cautious on the issue, as the Troika has been since Athens raised it earlier this year.
Another matter to be discussed is how large the fiscal gap for 2015 and 2016 is likely to be. The Troika estimates it will reach 4 billion euros ($5.23 billion,) whereas the Finance Ministry puts the figure at 2.7 billion ($3.53 billion).