“Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead” could sum up the leftist SYRIZA government’s intent to rehire a few thousand people to “restock” the civil service or wider public sector entities, from cleaners to vocation school instructors, and from school guards and administrative staff at Greece’s numerous and scattered universities.

Some 3,000 people have been rehired and another 3,700 are on their way, including no less than 1,500 people of all specialties for the “resurrected” state-run broadcaster, ERT.

The total annual cost of the rehirings is figured to total 19 million euros.

The hirings and rehirings have all been printed in the Government Gazette, with ministers taking advantage of the so-called “Katrougalos Law” for reinstatement of positions in the civil service or wider public sector that were eliminated when the object of tenured staff-members’ employment, their agencies or organization “got the axe” in order to streamline Greece’s cavernous public sector.

Katrougalos, in fact, acquired some notoriety a few months ago when it was discovered that his law firm was signing clients even after the Jan. 25 election to petition courts for their rehiring, with a commission to be paid if case their cases were successful.