TA NEA

The big change

Voters to directly vote for candidates in European Parliament elections

Major changes to the pre-election period have been brought about by the government’s decision to do away with party lists for the selection of MEP candidates, opting instead to move towards giving more power to citizens by implementing the method of direct selection of candidates. The decision by Samaras and Venizelos appears to have wrong-footed SYRIZA and sent a chill through the ‘group of 58’ MPs of the center left.

 

 

NAFTEMPORIKI 
 

Creditors want strict monitoring and oversight

New aid package will come on condition of structural reforms and under threat of penalties

The ‘next day’ of the second memorandum will not involve new fiscal measures but it appears that it will come attached with specific conditions for structural reforms and penalties in the event of non-compliance. Officials in Brussels with knowledge of the negotiations currently taking place between Athens and the troika stress that while the desire is for Greece to be supported in order for it to stand on its own two feet financially, under no circumstances can this happen without close monitoring and oversight from its creditors. This is because the accepted wisdom in European circles is that the absence of effective state bureaucracies in critical areas such as civil service administration, management of the revenue service and overseeing of spending, render the positive fiscal results of 2013 (the elimination of the twin deficits and achievement of a primary budget surplus) unsustainable.

PROTO THEMA (SUNDAY)

Revenue Auditors seeking ‘major wealth’ identify transfers:

Three New Democracy MPs moved 3.5 mln euros abroad

The money is not accounted for by the MPs income declarations.

Also 600 top doctors, lawyers and engineers have sent another 2 bln euros abroad. Two well-known business figures are called to answer for 40 million euros in ‘black money’ that were transferred out of the country. 

ELEFTHEROTYPIA (SUNDAY)

Prosecutor to two ministers: J’Accuse!

Free pass given for corruption!

The revealing document sent to Stournaras and Athanasiou: ‘Don’t block investigations’

Serious allegations of attempts to cover-up financial scandals and gross mismanagement in the public sector have emerged from a document sent to the government from the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor of Thessaloniki Argyris Dimopoulos. The letter was sent following reports of the elimination of the Finance Inspectorate as a regulatory body, something the prosecutor said would be outrageous.

 

 

DIMOKRATIA

Toll booth set alight in Malakasa

Violent protests by citizens enraged at recent toll price hikes.