Political “faux paus”, poor communication or an intentional snub? No matter what the reason, outgoing premier and New Democracy leader Antonis Samaras on Monday opted not to attend a traditional handover ceremony where the outgoing premier greets and briefs his successor at the prime ministerial office.

In breaking yet another modern Hellenic political rite – following Tsipras’ insistence on a civil oath of office — neither Samaras nor his successor arrived for the usually short but symbolically laden event.

The downgraded “aide-to-aide” handover ceremony generated an angry response by SYRIZA and negative comments by several ND deputies towards the outgoing Samaras administration, according to reports.

A first mention of political snafu leaked from ND headquarters, with sources laconically mentioning that a top Samaras aide would hand over the office to a counterpart from Tsipras’ side. A second statement then blamed the SYRIZA side, claiming that top SYRIZA cadre Nikos Papas phoned Samaras aide Costas Bouras to tell him who would be present at the ceremony – an indirect way of saying Alexis Tsipras wasn’t attending, or, didn’t want to meet with his predecessor.

“What occurred was unprecedented. There was no one from the previous government to greet the prime minister. It’s indicative of their political culture,” sources close to Tsipras said.

In the end, Samaras aide Costas Bouras greeted Tsipras’ legal adviser Dimitris Tzanakopoulos and turned over the “office keys”.

Tsipras was sworn in earlier on Monday as the new PM at the presidential palace, located just across the side street from the Maximos Mansion — the official seat of the Greek prime minister and the government house, located in downtown Athens.