Greece’s typically fragmented opposition parties are looking to coordinate efforts against the conservative New Democracy government, which they accuse of a cover-up of the Tempi rail tragedy.

According to the Athens News Agency, the leaders of SYRIZA, PASOK,KKE,  the New Left, and Course for Freedom exchanged phone calls yesterday to push for such a pre-agenda debate in Parliament on the issue.

This renewed push comes after several revelations regarding the deadly 2023 Tempi rail crash that hit headlines last week, stalled out investigations, and massive nationwide protests across the country on Sunday.

SYRIZA leader Sokratis Famellos, PASOK’s Nikos Androulakis, New Left leader Alexis Charitsis, and Course of Freedom’s Zoe Konstantopoulou, all ostentatiously participated in the protest over the rail tragedy in Athens’ central Syntagma Square.

They were amidst tens of thousands of Greeks gathered in front of the country’s Parliament to express their anger about what many claim was a cover-up, holding up placards and signs with “I can’t breathe” or “Justice” on them.

“I can’t breathe” are the final words of one of the victims in the crash in a phone call to emergency services, made public in a recording last week. The harrowing voice recordings of people trying to escape the flames moments after the crash have undermined the government’s years-long narrative that deaths were caused simply by the collision impact and the subsequent fire from the trains’ transformer oil. 

In fact, a committee of experts commissioned by the victims’ families submitted a report last week with findings that the deaths of 30 passengers occurred after the collision and were linked to the presence of large amounts of so far unknown flammable liquids, not transformer oil.

After the protests on Sunday, SYRIZA’s Famellos called for a parliamentary debate to hold Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis accountable, asserting “Prime Minister Mitsotakis will come to Parliament to give an explanation to the Greek people.”

The KKE party has already proposed a pre-agenda parliamentary debate to compel the government to address the tragedy, and it looks that the other opposition parties will be looking to take the topic once again to the parliament floor. 

In a television interview Monday, PASOK’s Androulakis pointed to delays in the investigation and alleged that the audio evidence suggested some victims could have survived if rescue operations had been timely. PASOK has vowed to act on any new evidence regarding the tragedy.

He additionally criticized the state broadcaster ERT for downplaying Sunday’s protests in its news coverage, calling its behavior “unacceptable,” and accused the government of attempting to manipulate public perception. “Anyone who seeks the truth cannot be bombarded by the media serving New Democracy,” he said. 

New Democracy government spokesperson, Pavlos Marinakis in turn attacked the center-left and left parties, alleging that they are trying to find a “political lifeline” through a tragic accident. “It’s not just sad, it’s more than that, it’s disgusting,” he stated in a press conference on Monday.

Marinakis dismissed the allegations against state broadcaster ERT, commenting, among other things, that “I would have expected the leader of the main opposition to be more serious.”

For its part, ERT responded that the broadcaster: “performs its institutional role with the required commitment to ethical rules, and covers all the facts with full validity and credibility. This rule was fully respected by the news department of public television and radio, also in the coverage and transmission of the rallies for the Tempi accident in Athens and other cities of the country.”