SYRIZA Sees Greek Debt Restructure

The major opposition party Coalition of the Radical Left (SYRIZA) is continuing to press its belief and agenda that Greece’s staggering $390 billion debt and loans due the Troika of the European Union-International Monetary Fund-European Central Bank must be written down.
SYRIZA officials have reportedly said that it will inevitably happen by the end of 2014 even if there is a change in government and it supplants the current New Democracy-PASOK coalition. Prime Minister Antonis Samaras, the ND leader, has floated the idea of Greece giving a so-called “haircut” to the Troika to bring down the country’s debt but that’s been rejected out of hand.
But SYRIZA said the math only works for Greece to repay what it owes if it doesn’t have to repay all that it owes, which means taxpayers in the other 16 countries of the Eurozone would be forced to pick up the tab for generations of wild overspending by successive ND and PASOK governments that hired hundreds of thousands of needless workers in return for votes.
SYRIZA said that projections Greece can raise 22 billion euros ($28.97 billion) by 2018-19 is wishful thinking given the woeful record of the country’s attempt so far to sell off its enterprises, even at bargain basement prices.
SYRIZA MP Giorgos Stathakis told Vima 99.5 FM that based on debates in Germany – the biggest contributor to Greek bailouts – ahead of the Sept. 22 election there in which Chancellor Angela Merkel is seeking to return to office and beat back a challenge from Peer Steinbrueck – that from 2014-16 Greece will be called to pay back 83 billion euros ($109.32 billion) in interest, not including EU funding and under the provision that this sums come from economy surpluses and privatization.
“”That is why Steinbrueck say Greece will be faced with a greater deficit, about 77 billion. That is what he means, that Greece will be unable to find the money from these sources. So, the renegotiation of the Greek debt must be a given, regardless of which government is around, however bailout-friendly it might be”.
He said that the funding gap can be covered either by a third bailout, which he considers unlikely considering the failure of the Greek example and a “de facto” restructuring of the debt, which in conjunction with alternative funding can make the economy viable again.