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Venizelos Won't Oust Papandreou Over Bill Vote Defiance

Former premier George Papandreou (L) and PASOK leader Evangelos Venizelos aren't really this close
Former premier George Papandreou (L) and PASOK leader Evangelos Venizelos aren’t really this close

PASOK leader Evangelos Venizelos – without naming him – blistered former Socialist leader and previous premier George Papandreou for voting against a key article in a reform bill that passed Parliament, but didn’t oust him or another veteran MP, Apostolos Kaklamanis, who also defied his orders how to vote on a different measure.
Venizelos issued a strongly-worded statement criticizing Papandreou without naming him specifically.
“Hypocrisy and personal political games are what led this country and the political system to today’s situation,” said the PASOK leader. “These are the kind of practices that we need to overturn.”
Venizelos also accused Papandreou of failing to raise the issue in the days leading up to the vote, when PASOK MPs met to discuss the content of the omnibus bill.
Papandreou responded to his successor with a sarcastic shot back at Venizelos, who six years ago failed in a bid to bump Papandreou from the party leadership.
“It is true that hypocrisy and personal political games are what led this country and the political system to today’s situation,” he said. “These are the kind of practices that we need to overturn.”
Venizelos’ party, a coalition partner in the government of Prime Minister Antonis Samaras, the New Democracy Conservative leader,  is down to 27 MPs from the 33 seats it earned in the 2012 elections because he has ejected lawmakers for voting against his orders.
But with the government having a slim majority in Parliament – and facing the embarrassing prospect of kicking out a former prime minister who is the son of the disappearing party’s founder – Venizelos settled for a reprimand although the two publicly embrace each other.
The Parliament passed the reform bill after Samaras and Venizelos twisted arms among would-be rebels in their party upset that it extended the shelf life of fresh milk and would bring in foreign competition to Greek dairy farmers.
But Papandreou voted against a second article which would set up a new legal framework for state banks and let them sell shares at a loss to private investors, a proposal which also drew negative votes from the major opposition Coalition of the Radical Left (SYRIZA).
Papandreou said he had reservations against the bank reforms and went against his party leader, although when the former premier was in power he also booted his party’s lawmakers who did what he did. The article will see the bank recapitalization fund take big losses on some of its shares.
PASOK’s Kaklamanis voted “present” on the bank reform but went along with the key first article which contained the liberalization measures that drew vehement opposition from pharmacies and independent stores who would see competition they said could devastate their industries.
The bill was the result of seven months negotiation with the Troika of the European Union-International Monetary Fund-European Central Bank (EU-IMF-ECB) which said it continue to withhold a nine billion euro installment unless it was approved without a single change.
The vote means the money could be released when Eurozone finance chiefs meet in Athens on April 1 as part of a schedule set because Greece holds the rotating European Union Presidency until June 30.
The government won the vote with 152 MPs supporting the first article and 151 the second, a bare majority in the 300-member body even without six missing MPs from the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party who are in detention awaiting trial on charges of running a criminal gang.
The coalition suffered one loss though as Samaras threw out New Democracy deputy Nikitas Kaklamanis, who did not vote for either article. He had been upset that Samaras supported another party official, Aris Spiliotopoulos, as the its candidate for Mayor of Athens in May elections. Kaklamanis, the former mayor, said he’d run anyway, showing the growing friction in the party.
Kaklamanis’s ouster meant that the government went down to 152 seats in Parliament. If Venizelos had tossed out Papandreou and Apostolos Kaklamanis, the coalition would have only 150 seats, although with the absence of the Golden Dawn MPs it needs only 148 votes – less than a majority of the whole body – to pass legislation.
 

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