“It is depressingly typical for a government that, for all its high popularity at home, has squandered every opportunity to improve its lot, and ultimately that of the euro zone,” says a report on The Economist.
The article criticizes Greece’s negotiation strategy calling it “small-minded, self-defeating and naive.” Despite the Greek prime minister’s ambition that the changes the SYRIZA-led leftist government will bring to Greece would benefit all Europeans, Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis has failed to convince his euro zone counterparts.
According to the writer, it was a mistake for Mr. Varoufakis to state that, “The disease that we’re facing in Greece is that a problem of insolvency for five years has been treated as a problem of liquidity.” The statement showed that the Greek finance minister, and subsequently the new Greek government, do not have an understanding of the euro zone’s rules.
The Greek stance on the bailout issue is put down to the inexperience of Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and his cabinet. SYRIZA has made references to the Nazi occupation of Greece. Euro zone officials got angry seeing Greece leaking private discussion papers. The new Greek government had insisted for long on a “bridging deal” that would allow it to slow down on reforms.
“Greece’s survival in the euro depends on two factors largely outside its control: the willingness of the ECB to keep its banks on life support, and that of the Eurogroup to strike a long-term financing deal (Mr. Varoufakis avoids the term “bail-out”) to keep the country afloat. It has weakened its hand on both fronts,” the report says.
Meanwhile, Greek banks see depositors withdrawing an average of 2 billion euros a week as negotiations continue without results. Greece will have a liquidity problem unless an agreement is reached by February 28.
If Mr. Tsipras was a little more diplomatic, he could give Europe an “alternative narrative” to the German-inspired austerity. With the popular mandate to back him, he could win some allies, such as Italy and France, and even inside the European Central Bank.
Yet by sticking to his rhetoric and backtracking on reasonable reforms, “he has alienated more or less everyone. That is quite some achievement,” the report concludes.
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