Yesterday, the developments in government campas shortly before the Prime Minister’s speech in Parliament on motion of no confidence it became known that two of his closest associates Kyriakou Mitsotakisthe Minister of State Stavros Papastavrou and the deputy minister in addition to the Prime Minister Yannis Bratakossubmitted their resignations, with the prime minister thanking them for their cooperation and making them immediately acceptable.
The resignations follow the revelation that on Sunday night the two close associates of the prime minister were at a social event of the businessman Evangelos Marinakiswhile it had been preceded by the publication (of “Vima”) which had caused a motion of censure against the government.
According to what is reported today in the Theoreo column of “K”scripts are already being traded cand their possible replacements, with Makis Voridis being heard for Papastavrou’s position and Giorgos Mylonakis and Michalis Bekiris for the position of Bratakos.
The Chronicles
Government spokesman Pavlos Marinakis spoke of a “war of attrition of the elected government” in which “organized economic interests” are taking part.
“Their participation in a social event sent the wrong message,” government sources said.
His strategy Maximus was clear: to denounce an attempt to destabilize the country, in which the Nikos Androulakis he was playing the role of “willing” by adopting a story that, according to the government, was nothing more than a distortion of reality. Indicative of the confrontation that started on Sunday is that Maximou asked all the members of the Parliamentary Group to post on their personal social networks a harsh response to the article, calling it “fake news”.
With this strategy, Maximos went to the motion of no confidence, accusing his president PASOK as “willing”. And somewhere there came the news that the two top ministers were at the social event, giving the PASOK president the right to reverse the charge. “Two executives having drinks on a Sunday night? Your ministers were with this businessman”, was the characteristic reference made by Nikos Androulakis.
After resignation, government sources noted that “their participation in a social event sent the wrong message”. The Prime Minister himself, coming to Parliament for his speech, was asked about the resignations saying: “That’s what politics has, listen to my speech.”
Shortly after the resignations, Nikos Androulakis, commenting on the developments from the floor of the Parliament, said that “the core of the corruption is in Maximos”. Immediately after the resignation of the two ministers, SYRIZA reported that “once again they were caught with the goat on their back. The forced “resignations” of Kyriakos Mitsotakis’s closest associates confirm the tangle in which the New Democracy government has plunged. After Grigoris Dimitriadis, today it was the turn of Yiannis Bratakos and Stavros Papastavros. Good luck in the future.” The New Left, for its part, noted that “every time Mr. Mitsotakis finds himself apologizing for the cover-up attempts he orchestrates, he also sacrifices one of his close associates in order to escape the social outcry. He also did so in the case of surveillance with the removal of Mr. Dimitriadis. He is doing it now with Mr. Bratako and Mr. Papastavrou. But one is the one who has immunity and is protected at all costs: Mr. Karamanlis”. Finally, the KKE commented that “the resignations of two government ministers – and even from the prime minister’s close circle – do not change the essence in the slightest: on the one hand, the indisputable relations and bargains of the government and bourgeois parties with big business interests, even if all this is called “social gatherings”, on the other hand the anecdote of the days, that supposedly “organized interests” are fighting the government of the National Democratic Republic.