A TEAM representing Greece’s so-called troika of international lenders is expected to finish its inspection of the country’s finances today, after completing talks with the country’s finance minister yesterday.
“After a long series of talks and meetings with representatives of the troika, we have concluded scheduled meetings and the mission is expected to be concluded by tomorrow,” Greek finance minister Evangelos Venizelos told a parliamentary committee yesterday.
Troika officials indicated there were still a number of technical issues to be ironed out by today.
At the centre of the latest talks were the 2013 and 2014 budgets, with the troika inspectors insisting that further austerity measures to the tune of at least €6 billion would be necessary to bring the Greek deficit down to below three per cent of GDP.
Last night, the Greek media was reporting that the debt inspectors had also requested that existing national wage agreements be abolished to reduce labour costs in the private sector by at least a fifth and that a new uniform pay scale for civil servants be extended to all semi-state companies and utilities.
Unions have responded to the government’s plans with a barrage of strikes and work stoppages, which yesterday brought the public transport system in Athens to a complete stop, and heavy delays at Athens airport.
Mounds of rubbish lie uncollected on the capital’s streets as municipal workers continue their strike and occupations of landfills into a second week.
The opposition has also been scathing of the government. Ruling out any possibility of a coalition with the ruling socialists, conservative leader Antonis Samaras told his New Democracy party yesterday that the Pasok government could no longer negotiate with the troika because it had lost all legitimacy, at home and abroad.
Meanwhile, Greece’s central bank and finance ministry signed off on the first nationalisation of one of the country’s banks in order to save it. Using a rescue fund set up under the May 2010 bailout agreement, Proton Bank was yesterday put into liquidation, divested of its toxic debts and its sound assets moved to a new entity called New Proton Bank.
A fortnight ago, a former major shareholder at the bank reached a settlement with prosecutors after he reportedly agreed to pay €51 million to the bank in return for all charges relating to an embezzlement investigation concerning the same amount of money to be dropped. Although the government was quick to present Proton as a unique case, the nationalisation put intense pressure on Greek bank stocks, which were down -10.41 per cent at the close of trading on the Athens Stock Exchange.