For three years, Kyriakos Mitsotakis and Nikos Androulakis did not have the privilege of direct communication. The two men knew each other…from a distance and only through confrontation. Yesterday, for an hour and a quarter, the ice was undeniably “broken” and the discussion between the prime minister and the head of the opposition was described as “very good” and “institutional” by the Maximou Mansion as well.

At length, the two men discussed the major issues of foreign policy and geopolitical challenges, and then got into the full range of domestic material, with the prime minister “granting” the privilege of the first move to Androulakis, who presented various thoughts and proposals.

The common thread of the discussion, beyond individual convergences and logical divergences, is that the prime minister and the leader of the opposition can have a direct channel of communication and discuss major issues or those that go beyond the term of a government. For instance, when the discussion turned to demographic issues, Mitsotakis described to Androulakis the initiatives the government has undertaken and gave him a hard copy of the national strategy presented a few months ago. At the same time, he appeared open to discussing PASOK’s proposals, both on demography and on housing. Constitution, however, Mitsotakis reportedly told Androulakis that he has no “taboos” given the upcoming debate on the selection of articles to be revised, which will take place at a later date.

This does not mean that the government is unhesitatingly adopting Androulakis’ proposal to decouple the selection of Supreme Court judges from the Cabinet, while the prime minister also re-announced an initiative for returnable voting in national elections – on the model of the European elections.

Crash test the Presidency

In any case, the government does not expect that PASOK will abandon its sharp opposition strategy. “They will implement their strategy and we will implement ours,” a senior government source said, stressing that the government will not be deterred by PASOK’s stance on a number of issues.

On some major ones, however, there should be a minimum of consensus. On the budget, for example, PASOK will vote for defense spending as it did last year, while by the end of the year, the government is expected to finalize its choice for the position of Public Defender in order to “pass” it through the Conference of Presidents in the New Year. This will also require the cooperation of PASOK.

The major area of consensus, however, is the Presidency of the Republic. Mitsotakis hasn’t put his cards on the table yet, which he will do in the New Year after weighing all the policy options. The re-selection of Katerina Sakellaropoulou seems rather unlikely, but the prime minister acknowledges that the person chosen will have to have cross-party characteristics. And, if possible, he or she should also be elected with a majority that exceeds the number of members of the Southwest, so as not to be perceived as a “narrowly partisan” President. Of course, it accepts suggestions and weighs persons from the center-right, while behind the scenes there are “raging” scenarios that Evangelos Venizelos, a person that many “blue” people would support, will be proposed from PASOK. On the other hand, several sources mention the name of the Speaker of the Parliament, Kosta Tasoulas, while recently the name of the former Prime Minister, Loukas Papademou, has been “playing” in the background.