PAULOS POLAKIS

Since the removal of Pavlos Polakis from the SYRIZA parliamentary group, the most frequent question to the party’s executives and MPs has been whether the Chania member of parliament is really a past member of the party or if the clock is just counting down until he rejoins the parliamentary group . As it happened, with his letter, Nikos Pappas informed Konstantinos Tassoulas that Pavlos Polakis is rejoining the party’s parliamentary group.

Stefanos Kasselakis, even though he had punished his member of parliament for indecent behavior towards an employee of the Parliament and an associate of the Minister of Health, had said that he loved him. Which proves that the return of the MP of Chania was only a matter of time. The deletion of Athena Linou, with whom Pavlos Polakis has an open confrontation with characterizations and almost daily attacks, is interpreted by some as the president of SYRIZA trying to extend a hand of friendship to Mr. Polakis. Lately, after all, Pavlos Polakis had raised his voice even against the president of SYRIZA, criticizing the leadership while leaving open the possibility of claiming the leadership himself.

The atmosphere that Pavlos Polakis had created shakes the 7th floor of Koumoundourou. It is no secret that Stefanos Kasselakis maintained personal and friendly relations with the former deputy minister while he himself had brought him to SYRIZA. This development, therefore, may not have surprised anyone, but it does not mean that it did not bring embarrassment to parliamentarians and officials.

The phone call to Papa

On Tuesday morning, Mr. Kasselakis contacted Nikos Pappa by phone. He announced his decision to him. Pavlos Polakis returns to the parliamentary group. Immediately, the president of the parliamentary group called the MP of Chania. According to Vimas information, the two men had a few minutes of conversation, which simply announced the decision of Mr. Kasselakis with Pavlos Polakis hanging up the phone saying, “ok”.

It is noted that at the time it became known that Pavlos Polakis was returning to KO, Sokratis Famellos was leaving the Parliament. He was the man who sent the letter of his deletion to the president of the Parliament, while he had argued with him when he had entered the meeting of the parliamentary group with his will, despite his deletion. What he thought when he heard this development would be of particular interest, but he himself avoided any comment or discussion with those present.

On the other hand, Pavlos Polakis is not backing down. His return, after his “unacceptable deletion” does not change anything of what he has said and expressed, he emphasized during his statements in the Parliament peristyle. “As I stated on the day of my unacceptable deletion, I was, am and will be in SYRIZA. I had stated, the people delete. The people did not delete,” while insisting on his claim that his deletion was staged.

Polakis: I never left

“I am not a child to be deleted without notice and to be reinstated by Nikos Pappas,” he said. Taking a dig at Kasselakis, the MP said that some are trying to correct the unacceptable. This is a formal return, he said, because I never left SYRIZA. And he meaningfully added that “the political assessment I have made with the political problem of SYRIZA does not change in any way. There is a need for a dynamic official opposition, with a programmatic role,” she noted, which will bring down the government.

Sending a message to the 7th floor of Koumoundourou, he said: “Everything I have said is true.” At the same time, he gave an appointment to the Central Committee of the party.

Nikos Pappas, a short time later, in the peristyle of the Parliament, made it clear that the circle of “punishment” Polakis was closed. “It is a clear decision. Pavlos Polakis suffered a penalty for behavioral issues, this cycle is closed, we are moving forward”, he commented characteristically.

“I have also said in other public positions that there is the ground for a reorganization and counterattack of the party. In this effort, many people can contribute and offer,” said the president of the parliamentary group, emphasizing that “there are no members with reduced rights. Political criticism is a reserved right, anyone can do it. We discuss everything democratically, we move forward.”

As for the previous statements by Pavlos Polakis, despite the journalists’ persistent questions, Mr. Pappas avoided any comment.

However, the return of Polakis did not go unnoticed by New Democracy. The parliamentary representative, Thanos Pleuris, speaking in the Parliament in a particularly mocking way, commented that his deletion was pretentious and added that “SYRIZA has the face it deserves”.

Embarrassment in parliamentarians and executives – Reactions

Some MPs did not hide their surprise at the president’s decision. Some expressed their disappointment at the setbacks, which do not give a good image of the party to the outside, on the contrary, it further aggravates the climate internally.

SYRIZA MPs are embarrassed by the playful comments of their colleagues from other parties. “You’re going to drive us crazy,” they commented with MPs replying, “you’re not wrong”, smiling tightly.

Controversy continues in SYRIZA, as one day after the stormy meeting of the party’s Parliamentary Group, in which Nikos Pappas was elected as its new leader, following a proposal by Stefanos Kasselakis and a marginal vote, which was held when the former leader, Sokratis Famellos, refused to surrender his position, the case of the deletion of Athena Linou dominates the news.

Specifically, SYRIZA excluded Mrs. Linou from its Parliamentary Group, with its president, Stefanos Kasselakis stating: “I have not been satisfied with her explanations and my office has requested her resignation and the facilitation of handing over the chair . He has not responded to anything, no phone calls, no sms and no whatsapp. We await her response. The request we have made is on record, it is clear that she must hand over her seat to the first runner-up. Responding to messages whether by phone or text is a minimal sample of responsiveness that should be present at this time.”

A little later, the new head of the Parliamentary Group, Nikos Pappas, sent the letter of deletion of Mrs. Linou to the president of the Parliament, Costas Tasoula. It was the first official act signed by the new president of K.O. Nikos Pappas, who then met in his office on the second floor of the Parliament with the first runner-up MP Marilisa Xenogiannakopoulou, who avoided making any comment on her way out.

Athena Linou’s answer

Athina Linou, for her part, responded directly to SYRIZA, with her statement, in which, among other things, she stated that she will not resign as an MP, while she accused Mr. Kasselakis of behaving as an “uncalled judge”.

“I am not going to resign as a member of the Greek Parliament, nor surrender the seat that was given to me by 25,000 or more of my voters,” Athina Linou clarifies in her statement in response to Kasselaki’s statements, shortly after her official removal from K.O. . of SYRIZA with a letter from Nikos Pappas to the Speaker of the Parliament.

The member of parliament for the Northern sector of Athens also states that she is not going to accept a non-existent guilt for the Prolepsis institute and wonders when the president of SYRIZA managed to read the 459 pages of evidence that prove the faultless as he points out its management.

It states in detail:

“Dear Mr. Kasselakis,

You asked me today through the Director of your office, Mr. Kapnisakis, to resign from my position as an MP of the SYRIZA-PS party, allegedly citing a lack of transparency in my work and already making relevant public statements.

In this way you are asking me to accept a non-existent guilt. Obviously, this is not possible for me to do. You also understand, of course, that in this way you are admitting that you are participating in the malicious slanders of Mr. Polakis against me, acting as an uninvited judge.

And it’s a wonder when you got around to reading the 459 pages of evidence proving the impeccable management of Prolepsis to make your morally and logically meteoric claim. So I am informing you that I am not going to resign as a member of the Greek Parliament, nor to surrender the seat that was given to me by my 25,000 plus voters”.

SYRIZA: “Its seat belongs to the party”

The last, so far, episode in the Linou series, the announcement issued by SYRIZA, in which it states that its seat belongs to the party and that it will have to hand it over.

The announcement in detail:

“The SYRIZA PS, by order of its President, Stefanos Kasselakis, proceeded to delete Ms. Athina Linou from the K.O. of the party for reasons of transparency.

1. The 25,000 votes that Ms. Linou received as a SYRIZA candidate were never disputed.

2. Mrs. Linou avoided providing the clarifications and data requested of her, which she continues to do with her statement today. As is known, it is an inalienable right not to incriminate oneself…

3. When he was sworn in as a member of parliament, he signed the regulation of the parliamentary group of SYRIZA PS, which explicitly states that the seat belongs to the party and not to itself.”

Linou: “Kasselakis wants to build a Polish party”

In her post, Ms. Linou states that she is relieved by the developments as, as she mentioned, she will now deal again with issues that concern us all such as mental and physical health and the rights of the vulnerable.

Check out her post:

The leadership group of Koumoundourou is attempting a plan to appease “apsy” Pavlos Polakis with the deletion of Athena Linou in the wake of the stormy meeting of the K.O. of SYRIZA where the absolute division of its members prevailed.

The slim majority obtained by the Kasselakis proposal for the replacement of Sokratis Famellos by the “ally” of the party president, in view of the decisive intra-party contests of the Central Committee and the Statutory Congress, Nikos Pappas, certified the gap with “87” bringing closer to the break with the “Tsipras guard”.

Disappointing climate in K.O.

The climate in K.O. despite the prevalence of the “chosen” of Stefanos Kasselakis, it is disappointing and embarrassing, as most MPs experience the existential vacuum that exists in the main opposition party and are pressured by the serious upheavals and conflicts that are raging, erasing an uncertain future.

In this climate, Athena Linou’s refusal to hand over the seat, as she was asked, exacerbates the ominous climate that exists. The loss of one more seat for SYRIZA acquires particular weight if one considers that its parliamentary strength is getting closer and closer to the psychological limit of 31 MPs counted by K.O. of PASOK. After the deletion of Polakis and Linos, SYRIZA has 34 MPs, with the risk, if there are other leaks and it falls under the influence of PASOK’s parliamentary power, of losing the position of official opposition.

Determined to complete the transformation plan

In any case, the Kasselaki leadership group seems determined to go all the way in order to clarify the internal party landscape so that the president of SYRIZA can complete, freed from the internal pressures he is under, the plan of complete transformation of the party. In the course of the final settlement of accounts with “87” and the Tsipras wing, the attitude of Pavlos Polakis acquires a special significance.

If his “appeasement attack” pays off, which will mark his return to K.O. and an upgraded political role of his – already the independent member of parliament of Chania spoke about his justification on the occasion of the deletion of Mrs. Linou “and a lesson to those who thought they found the opportunity to mess with me… inside and outside…”, declaring that “we continue for deep changes”, with whatever this may mean – then Mr. Kasselakis will have managed to gain additional “points” in terms of intra-party relations in view of the “final showdown” with the “87”.

Is Polakis willing to put water in his wine?

It remains to be seen to what extent Mr. Polakis is willing – if at all – to put water in his wine, who recently in the Political Secretariat directly questioned the possibility of Mr. Kasselakis, once his chosen one, to serve a plan to overthrow Kyriakos Mitsotakis and of entanglement.

What is certain is that the tenant of Koumoundourou will do everything to convince Mr. Polakis to the contrary, although no one can know if he will be able to do so now. However, according to Mrs. Linou, SYRIZA is turning into a “polar” party, as Stefanos Kasselakis “clearly” made a choice of Pavlos Polakis in the conflict with her.

As the now independent member of parliament wrote, “unfortunately, I gave enough leeway to Mr. Kasselakis to decide what kind of party he wants to lead, and he decided that the party he leads will turn into a “polar one”, adding: “However, I am sure that the disastrous course of the current Polakis/Kapnisakis/Kasselakis party will sooner or later stop”.