The final summer vacationers have returned, the autumn showers came early, schools are opening on Thursday and after a short break, Greek life is returning to normalcy.
As the summer gives way to autumn, the households have to deal with the many needs and woes; despite the optimism, the Greek people continue to lift many burdens and sense that the end of the huge crisis will be late, it will not come by magic and will demand more efforts and sacrifices – personal and collective.
The Prime Minister told us all he had to say in Thessaloniki, the leader of the main opposition will tell us on Saturday. The political tension is increasing as expected, but the Greek problem will persist, as we cannot find a solution that we need or want.
Unfortunately for us the international and financial circumstances are not the best.
On the contrary, the international problems got worse over the summer: the military conflicts in the Middle East and Ukraine have increased the uncertainty, while the recession has truly knocked on Europe’s door, as evident by the recently-announced fiscal measures.
The international financial and political dangers have increased this summer and are not the best omen for solving our problems.
In such an uncertain international environment settling the Greek debt will take some time, our partners and creditors will be more suspicious, the will double and triple check the money they are giving away to us and the guarantees that they will likely claim will be greater and constant supervision.
Those expect easy negotiations are in for a surprise.
The intentions in Paris were clear.
The Prime Minister downplayed his statements in Thessaloniki precisely because in Paris things did not work out as planned. And those who are making bold promises ought to give it some more thoughts.
It appears that our partners remain suspicious and doubtful; they want to protect themselves against the dangers and will probably not discuss a resettlement of the debt unless the country elects a President and does not go through early elections.
The people will be impatient, the parties will fight over the new President and our partners will wait for the dust the settle.
In a normal European country with a culture of negotiation, the political parties would select a reliable, mutually-accepted div for the position of President, they would ensure the political stability that would offer the guarantees for settling the debt and would leave the power struggle for later.
All this would happen in a normal European country.
In the irrational and impatient Greece though, that is not the case.
Five years of a huge crisis are not enough. We need six, seven and God knows how many more…
Antonis Karakousis
