The Cabinet reshuffle and removal of all those named in the OPEKEPE case files was an imperative move for the Prime Minister.
Whether it proves a sufficient response to the EU agricultural funds scandal remains to be seen.
In any case, the lifting of MPs’ parliamentary immunity and replacement of the party secretary will follow.
What is certain is that neither the government nor the New Democracy party can disregard or circumvent an ongoing legal process—especially one relating to such a sordid affair.
Did all of this come as an awful shock? Hardly. We’ve been hearing about dodgy dealings in agricultural subsidies for decades: the phantom livestock, inexplicable overnight wealth, thousands thrown away on carnations and broken plates in provincial bouzouki joints, and fleets of Porsche Cayennes.
But now the dirty bomb has blown up in the hands of the Mitsotakis government. Which will pay the political price, seeing as it did nothing to end it.
And while the courts and competent authorities will settle the criminal aspects of the case, political accountability will be judged at the ballot box.
At the same time, the government has a duty to restructure and clean up the subsidy system. And there simply is no more room for sly tricks and half-measures.
They got the ball rolling with the disbanding of the OPEKEPE and the transfer of its responsibilities to the Independent Authority for Public Revenue, which is regarded as reliable and sound. I don’t know if this counts as “half the battle”, but let’s wait and see what comes next.
Whatever happens, the OPEKEPE scandal has also shone an unforgiving light on one of the most repugnant aspects of a clientelist society. One unrelated to shady dealings, scheming tycoons or shameful transactions. Which concerns ordinary people who turn to their local MP or party representative to facilitate their financial transactions with the public sector.
Because something that should simply have been a matter of course for decades still requires the mediation of political and party authorities. The current administration may be paying the price, but the responsibility is shared by every party that have governed and by society as a whole.
The argument that the same thing happens in many other European countries (in most of them, perhaps…), and relates primarily to those European funds for which control mechanisms are not in place, is naive at best.
No other country is to blame if Greek society and the Greek political system tolerate the actions of opportunists and the patronage networks that serve them.
“That’s Greece!,” as Costas Simitis observed years ago with lucid self-awareness.
Yes. But that’s no reason not to change it.
