The formation of inquiry committees is a well-known and long-standing method, whenever a government is facing problems. The current proposal by the SYRIZA MPs, which aims to investigate the political responsibilities on how we entered the bailout program, is no different. It is yet one more initiative that will conclude with a predetermined outcome, just like in the past, with separate verdicts, according to the political estimations and the balance of power in Parliament.
The country’s problem is not how we got into the bailout program, but why and more importantly, how we will exit this crisis. After all, the political responsibilities which the inquiry will seek out, have been attributed in the multiple elections that have taken place. Parties have dissolved and politicians have vanished from the political map, precisely because the Greek people held them responsible. What more can an investigative committee do, which will avoid looking into what happened before 2010, when the problems that lead us to the crisis and the bailout grew substantially?
After five years of this crisis and political recantations it is time that we realized that the bailouts are the result of a deep, preexisting crisis of our production model, which invested in the squandering of public resources and over-consumption. There have been many errors and mistakes that were force upon us by the bailouts and our creditors. But let us not constantly shift our responsibilities to the bailouts, because then we will never get to leave them behind.
Shifting the discussion to how and not why we entered the bailout program does not offer anything to the necessary debate on how we will exit the bailout program sooner. It will simply rally political audiences and charge the political climate once more, at a time when we need the greatest possible political consensus to form a common national strategy.
TO VIMA
