A harsh response to Nikos Christodoulakis, who said there was another way – less painful – from the first memorandum, was given a short while ago by Pavlos Geroulanos, saying that “this is what Mr Samaras and Mr Tsipras were saying.”

The PASOK parliamentary spokesman in particularly aggressive tones turned against former minister and current head of the party’s Institute, Nikos Christodoulakis, spoke of the responsibilities of the Karamanlis administration that led to the economic crisis, stressed that PASOK’s goal today is to make every citizen aware of its views on the future and underlined, speaking to Action24 that: “Nikos Christodoulakis is an experienced executive who should know his role today and not open a debate that is for historians. His role today – he said of Mr Christodoulakis, who participates in the Political Centre – is the battle we are fighting to give PASOK a convincing alternative proposal for governance. It is an indifference after a good night for PASOK in parliament, for the preliminary investigation to raise this issue and discuss the past. Each of us has many opinions, but when you choose to present them is what matters.”

I am completely covered by their statement

Geroulanos stressed that “I am completely covered by the joint statement of the former finance ministers, Mr. Philip Sachinidis and Mr. George Papaconstantinou. The two former ministers – one of George Papandreou’s trusted associates – openly disagree with the opinion of Mr Christodoulakis (minister under Kostas Simitis), arguing that there was no other way than Greece’s recourse to the first European support mechanism in 2010. Addressing the professor emeritus and former minister, they stress in a mocking tone that: “We do not want to believe that Mr. Christodoulakis means that, instead of resorting to institutional lenders, it would have been preferable for the then PASOK government to have chosen the path of bankruptcy through its refusal to repay the government bonds that were maturing in May 2010. Without concrete proposals, the references to ‘other ways’ are no different from the ways promised by ND – of fake statistics – and SYRIZA – of abolishing the memoranda with an article and a law – but which both ND and SYRIZA failed to follow when they were mandated by the Greek citizens to govern.” Mr. Sachinidis and Mr. Papaconstantinou in a joint statement also said that: “We also do not want to believe that Mr. Christodoulakis means that PASOK could continue to conceal Greece’s true fiscal position, as the ND government of Kostas Karamanlis did when it sent fake statistics to Eurostat according to the European Parliament’s report. However, we would like to recall that, without a PASOK government under Prime Minister G. Papandreou, Ireland, Portugal, Spain, and Cyprus have followed the same path as Greece.”

We would like to remind you that, in the past, Ireland, Portugal, Spain, and Cyprus have followed the same path as Greece.

And citing specific economic data, they attempt to convince that: “It is not clear to us based on which school of economic thought one would assess the 2010 Budget as expansionary rather than restrictive, when it provided for a reduction of the budget deficit by 3.5 percentage points, while in the end the total measures taken by April 2010, i.e. in five months since PASOK took office, amounted to 15 billion euros in recessionary conditions. This reduced the deficit by 4.5 percentage points in 2010. And to have a measure of the difficulties, Mr Christodoulakis says that “we had to borrow another 2 billion or so to close the account, because the funds had large gaps in 1997”. The deficit that had to be closed in 2009 was EUR 36 billion. That is 18 times higher. No historical ratio of sizes.

The fierce attack on the current head of the PASOK Institute, Nikos Christodoulakis, ends with references to the circumstances and the need to support the PASOK’s course: “Unfortunately for some within PASOK, then and now, the reading of the causes of the 2009-2010 crisis coincides with the reading of the defenders of Kostas Karamanlis’ actions, and that of SYRIZA, which collaborated with the Independent Greeks in the name of an ostensibly progressive response to the crisis. It is not possible, after all that has happened, to still be talking about ‘other ways’. Our country will leave the crisis behind only when it decides to look the causes of the crisis in the face and accept the reality and the inevitable – and painful – choices of that era.”

Harris Doukas: Christodoulakis exonerates Karamanlis’ Southwestern Democratic Party

Earlier, Haris Dukas had gone on to deconstruct Christodoulakis’ view, accusing former PASOK minister and head of InSocial, Nikos Christodoulakis, that with his statements, he “simply exonerates New Democracy of Kostas Karamanlis” and absolves it of responsibility. “You are making a big mistake, Mr. Christodoulakis, with what you said about the Memorandum. 15 years later, you are telling us that you have discovered another way, which neither the Spanish, nor the Portuguese, nor the Irish, nor the Cypriots, nor the Greeks, have found in the face of the crisis,” PASOK Political Council member and Mayor of Athens Harris Doukas said. He continues in the same tone, calling on Harilaou Trikoupis to take a clear position. I am sure that neither Mr. Androulakis nor the executives of InSocial share these views.”

Note that Nikos Christodoulakis, who is currently at the “helm” of PASOK’s inSocial Institute, inSocial, responding yesterday to ONE on whether there was “another way beyond the memorandum”, argued: “Yes, I think there was. It is too difficult a discussion, especially for PASOK. Many cadres sacrificed themselves to pull the cart up. They fought battles for it. But I think another way could be found that is less painful”. According to the former minister, the 2008-2009 crisis was an “external deficit crisis” that then became a debt crisis.”

Manolis Christodoulakis, PASOK’s youngest MP, strongly criticized Mr. Nikos Christodoulakis, “reminding” him that many executives had carried the historical role on their backs at the cost of saving the country. “The need for a unified narrative of the party for the modern historical journey, not of PASOK but of the country, does not simply stem from the need to preserve internal unity in the present day, in an undoubtedly difficult political condition. It is dictated by the national and historical role played by PASOK in keeping the country standing, when some people were building political careers on the altar of national interest and social cohesion. A historic role that was borne not only by the central political figures of that era, who also took on the hard political and personal costs, but also by every single fighter of the party individually, in every town and village of Greece. Against populism and demagogy, which held us back and still hold us back. Not as PASOK, but as a country as a whole.

Former PASOK MP and PASOK Secretary Socrates Xynidis, on the occasion of Christodoulakis’ statements, attacked the party’s “Semites”, arguing that: “After all this unleashing of the former modernists against George Papandreou and their general disparagement of him, I think they should publicly apologise for Simitis’ choice to give him the succession ring in 2004, without following the statutory procedures”. Mr Christodoulakis was also opposed by a close associate of Pavlos Geroulanos (former Secretary General of Information), George Petroulakis, “identifying” the rhetoric of the head of the Institute with that of Adonis Georgiades. As he said: “And in the middle of it all, Mr. Nikos Christodoulakis came out to tell us that there was another way beyond the first memorandum, about ‘there is money’ and that the 2010 budget was ‘expansive”. Of course, he did not manage the hell that the Papandreou government inherited. But it has certainties. And then we wonder why we don’t stand up. When our first-rate executives talk like Adonis. Mercy. Really, mercy.”

Charilaou Trikoupis: Distances from both sides

Harilaou Trikoupis is taking a distance from both Nikos Christodoulakis and Harry Doukas on the issue. Sources at Harilaou Trikoupis responding to how they comment on the issue that has arisen indicate that they do not want to follow up and stress that PASOK, for the party’s “historically documented” position on entering the memoranda, “has a very clear view” on what happened in 2009. The same sources stress that PASOK “did everything possible to save the country” and that George Papandreou’s role “was catalytic, he did his best”. However, they point out that “now there is a big battle, everyone must stand up to the circumstances and not create issues. There is no need for a personal opinion to fuel introversion, at a time when we are in a phase of upheaval and frontal confrontation with the Southwest.”