Varoufakis 2.0: I am ready to return

Tsipras government did not use the referendum vote against creditors

Former Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis has a media magnet it seems. This time it was the turn of Italian newspaper Il Fatto Quotidiano to interview the Marxist professor turned politician.

He made it clear that he did not intend to quietly move off the center of the political arena, quite the opposite. “I am the politician with the most votes, and am ready to return”, he said. Varoufakis claimed that Greece was already in a state of default before Syriza assumed power, adding that what ensued after the Syriza victory was a political choice by the creditors to overthrow the left-wing government.

He accused the European Central Bank (ECB) of undermining the Syriza government from day one, while he categorically denied that he was to blame for anything. “Absolutely not. We all make mistakes but we were the victims here” he said. “The institutions abused us and and cut off all the oxygen until we gave up”, he said.

The former Minister says no-one believes in the deal, adding that the Prime Minister himself characterized it a disaster, while he underlines that no technical measures would help in implementing ‘a program that cannot be implemented’. He repeated his claim that he resigned himself on the night of the referendum because the government made the mistake of not using its outcome to put pressure on the creditors.