Main opposition New Democracy (ND) party leader Antonis Samaras launched a strong attack on Greek Prime Minister George Papandrou on Tuesday evening in response to the Prime Minister’s earlier address to PASOK parliamentarians.
Samaras accused the Papandreou of an “arrogant appearance, which troubles the entire Greek people”.
The ND leader also charged that the Prime Minister decided to destroy the politicial consensus between the two major parties in the runup to the announcement of new austerity measures and the visit to Greece of “important foreign leaders”.
He also accused Mr Papandreou of trying to absolve PASOK of any responsibility for Greece’s current economic problems and of ‘slandering’ New Democracy by trying to allocate sole responsibility for the economic crisis.
He also reacted to the comments made by the Greek Prime Minister about the request by New Democracy (ND) party for the postponement of Tuesday’s Parliamentary discussion on the stability and growth programme.
“It is outrageous if the Prime Minister thinks he can decide when New Democracy holds him to account,” Samaras said. “It is also outrageous that he criticises us for not accepting a parliamentary debate on measures which he has not yet taken.”
Samaras said that by not taking part in the debate, New Democracy did not have to suffer, “the well-known poem by the prime minister that for yesterday’s evils others are to blame, for today’s evils the speculators are to blame and for tomorrow we wait and see,” Samaras concluded.