Without deleting him, but distancing itself from the content of his post, the Syriza Progressive Alliance yesterday confronted its MEP, Nikos Pappas, who sparked a fierce wave of political reactions, both on and off the internet. The reason is his claim that New Democracy is a “breeding ground for murderers, paedophiles, rapists, criminals…national dumb [sic]“, as he wrote in his post.

A few days after the incident with the MP for Achaia, Andreas Panagiotopoulos, who had spoken of a “gang that rules us” referring to the government, only to acknowledge his mistake afterwards, the post of Member of Parliament of Koumoundourou caused immediate reflexes on the part of the government, with Government Spokesman Pavlos Marinakis calling for his deletion.

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This was preceded by the controversial post of the SYRIZA MEP on Instagram, where he shared a video of the stand up comedian, Christopher Zaralikos commenting in the form of a caption “breeding ground of murderers, pedophiles, rapists, criminals… national dumb” and accompanying his comment with the logo of the New Democracy Party. At the time, Government Spokesman Pavlos Marinakis accused Pappas of “unprecedented abusive rant“, pointing out that a sitting MEP was attacking members of an entire party with vulgar language. He noted that if SYRIZA was a “normal party”, Pappas would have already been expelled, without the need for government intervention.

“But because we are referring to the party of prefixes, threats and the logic of ‘us or them’ and ‘either we finish them or they finish us,’ we imagine that once again there will be cover for these miserable behaviors,” Marinakis said.

At the same time, the government spokesman accused the opposition that, at a time when society is demanding truth and justice for the tragedy of Tempe, “a part of it chooses to use the tragic accident as an excuse to sow hatred and division.”

Pappas’ deletion demanded by the Eurogroup of New Democracy

A request to delete Mr. Pappas from SYRIZA PS was also submitted by the ND Eurogroup, stating in a statement that “this particular behavior goes beyond any limit of political confrontation”.

In detail the statement:

“SYRIZA MEP Nikos Pappas has crossed every boundary of vulgarity. He reached the point of calling New Democracy a ‘breeding ground for murderers, pedophiles, rapists, criminals…’. As a representative of our country in the European Parliament, he hurls a barrage of unthinkable accusations against an entire party. This behaviour is beyond the bounds of political debate. We consider it self-evident that he should be expelled from his party. Any tolerance of this insulting rant and the toxicity it emits is tantamount to complicity.”

Syriza is embarrassed

Under the weight of political reactions, Koumoundourou yesterday rushed to condemn the characterizations of its MEP, without, however, raising the issue of Pappas’ deletion from the Eurogroup of SYRIZA. Specifically, in a statement, SYRIZA clarified that the offending post “does not express in any way” the party, but also spoke of “communication countermeasures” on the part of the ND, in the case of Tempi.

“The post of MEP Nikos Pappas, which he took down shortly afterwards, does not in any way express SYRIZA P.S. We condemn the characterizations. We will not contribute to the communication countermeasures that ND is anxiously seeking. Nothing can overshadow the universal demand for Truth and Justice,” Koumoundourou’s statement read.

At the same time, the fact that this is the second incident of inflammatory rhetoric by an elected official in recent days does not mean that Koumoundourou is not concerned, even if top Syriza officials privately condemn such characterizations as unnecessary and toxic. There are, however, more than a few who attribute the high tones and “heretical” positions to the anxiety of several political figures to identify with the general social climate, especially when the numbers of anti-systemic parties on the left of the political spectrum have shot up, causing anxiety for their political survival among several party cadres, if not the party itself.