Where is Greece now?

French Prime Minister Francois Hollande visited Athens and expressed his sympathy with the unemployed and those suffering under the Troika-driven austerity programme 

Πηγή: Al Jazeera
By Mathaios Tsimitakis
March 3 2013

How different does Greece look now than compared with 2009, when the economic crisis began?

Back then, much of the public cautiously hoped Greece's economic woes would be transient and solvable by the government. Οnce the bloated public sector was reformed, the argument went, Greece would return to growth within the European framework.

The majority of the population acknowledged that some reforms were indeed needed to save the economy, even if the solution meant a lower standard of living.

Five years and 21 national general strikes later, everybody acknowledges that the government's plans do not aim merely to fix the economy, but to fundamentally alter the country's political system. What began as a series of reforms to fix competitiveness and service the debt has become a cruel process of deprivation with several authoritative turns on the way. This threatens democratic decision-making and social cohesion.

Greece, which ranked 18th in the UN's development index in 2008, fell to 29th place by 2011, having lost almost 40 billion euros of its GDP. It is now in its sixth year of recession. Unemployment in 2009 was estimated at 9.6 percent. Today, the country has the highest rate of unemployment in the EU, with an official figure of 27 percent. That means 1.5 million people are out of work. Three and a half million people live below the official poverty line and 35 percent of all workers are unable to clear their mortgages and bank loans.

Humanitarian crisis

As a result, a humanitarian crisis has hit a developed nation. Large groups of people like migrants, elders in need of medical treatment, pupils from poor families, single-parent families and families with both parents unemployed are being cut off from the protective net of the welfare system.

Public health is worsening, medication is becoming harder to get for many, suicide rates have tripled and the number of homeless who now occupy the centres of larger cities has increased. Marginalisation and exclusion are the main fears of most young Greeks who now face an unemployment rate of 62 percent and have to solely depend on their families to survive or immigrate.

Social fragmentation also generates dangerous reflexes that have made traditionally hospitable Greek society turn xenophobic. The gap between those in fear of exclusion and those who are already excluded is spreading hate and fear. As several NGOs had predicted, the level of violence directed against migrants has reached alarming levels. Two Golden Dawn sympathisers were recently caught after stabbing to death a Pakistani immigrant in downtown Athens. Every other day, it seems, a new case of hate violence emerges.

Reports of torture in Greek police stations have caused groups like Amnesty International and even the UN to release strong statements naming this a human rights crisis as well as an economic one. The government, which decided to deal with the country's economic woes under the ideological mantra of TINA ("there is no alternative"), has adopted the supplementary concept of "law and order" to deal with social decay.

Thousands rally against austerity in Greece

However, with a large part of the police force leaning towards extreme right-wing politics and having to defend socially unjust decisions, order doesn't seem like an idea that can be applied equally to all. While hate crimes go largely unreported or downgraded both in the media and the judicial system, participating in protests is penalised and stigmatised as anti-social behaviour.

Just a few weeks ago, subway workers were forced to cancel their strike under an old law, dating back to Greece's authoritarian rule which was not applied by any government since then. A week later, seafarers were forced to abandon their strike under the same law. The government is planning to go further, changing the law for the creation of unions and limiting the right to strike.

What's more, as part of the plan the government will decide the level of minimum wage each year starting in 2014 depending on the economy's competitiveness! George Mergos, the general secretary of the Ministry of Finance, stated that the lower salary now in effect, 586 euro per month, is too high for the economy's standards. However, the government denied Mergos' claim.

But a few days later, commissioners Olli Rehn and Maria Damanaki insisted that the discussion is still open in the European Commission which thinks lowering salaries is a way to boost competitiveness in some European countries. Many are afraid that under the Troika mandate for internal devaluation, maybe the Bulgarian basic salary of 156 euro per month, or the Romanian one of 123 is not so far away.

Balancing the budget

This year, the government is expected to lay off 25,000 employees from the public sector, probably causing a domino effect in the private sector and reducing consumption even further.

So where is the country now and where is it heading? The Greek government and the IMF agree that the country will finally balance its budget this year, but it will do so at a devastating cost. Taking the deficit from 10.7 percent in 2009 to zero in 2013 without tackling tax evasion, restoring economic justice, in conditions of economic depression and based on cuts in the cost of workers, was a task that demanded the sacrifice of society.

The devastation is even worse in light of the IMF's public admission that its calculations for Greece were false. While the organisation estimated the fiscal multiplier to be 0.5 units - meaning that for every additional euro in tax revenue, the GDP would lose half a euro - in reality it was proven to be almost 2 units! What these numbers mean is that unemployment, poverty and suffering were miscalculated driving tens of thousands more into misery.

So, last Wednesday, when tens of thousands of workers all over Greece took to the streets once again, there was so much more to demand than higher salaries and pensions. Just a day earlier, French Prime Minister Francois Hollande visited Athens for a few hours and expressed his sympathy with the unemployed and those suffering under the Troika-driven austerity programme.

But the Greek unemployed couldn't care less for the sympathy of a social democrat who was elected with the promise to offer an alternative plan to Europe, one of growth and inclusion, only to end up following the German conservatives in the fiscal discipline doctrine. The only purpose of his visit to Greece was to bargain for cheap Greek assets and natural resources for French companies.

Now, many are looking towards the Bulgarian workers' struggle with hope. The neighbouring country served as a model to Greek public opinion. The fall of the government there after the Bulgarian workers' protests is yet another sign that neoliberalism is not the right way to go. Neither for Greece, nor for any European country.

Greece is facing a humanitarian crisis

'The number of homeless people has risen to unprecedented levels for a European country: unofficial estimates put them at 40,000.'

Πηγή: The Guardian
By Alex Politaki
Feb 11 2013

The EU's own poverty standards show that Greece is in crisis. But member states won't admit their 'bailout' was to blame.

European societies typically assume that humanitarian crises only take place in the aftermath of natural disasters, epidemics, wars or civil conflicts.That such a crisis could happen in a European country, especially one that is a member of the European Union, seems out of the question to many of us.

And yet a number of experts would maintain that Greece is currently in the centre of a humanitarian crisis. The head of Médecins du Monde, Nikitas Kanakis, the largest and most prominent NGO in Greece, was among the first to declare it openly. The port area of Perama, near Athens, in particular, is in the midst of a humanitarian disaster. The Medical Society of Athens, the largest professional body of its kind, has even sent a formal letter to the UN asking for intervention.

If this humanitarian crisis has so far been little talked about, there are political reasons why. By acknowledging the severity of the situation, the Greek government and the EU would also have admitted that the current state of affairs has been brought about by the so-called economic "rescue" of Greece. So the authorities have chosen to keep quiet.

It is true that there is no general agreement on what constitutes a humanitarian crisis. But the definition used by those with experience in the field is practical and straightforward. A humanitarian crisis is usually marked by rising poverty, heightened inequality in education and social protection, and lack of access to social welfare services. Particularly important indicators are loss of access to primary health services, medical examinations, hospitalisation and medication. In other words: when you see a crisis, you will not mistake it for anything else.

Greece never imagined that it could face a humanitarian crisis. According to the UN Human Development Index, in 2008 Greece was ranked 18th in the world. No one in the country really thought that this could change so dramatically.

It was false security offered by the institutions and mechanisms of the EU. Member states had to pay for this imaginary security by meeting demanding economic and political criteria. The paradox is that even the EU, the supposed guarantor of the security and prosperity of member states, has well-defined ways of measuring poverty, both absolute and relative, which show that a humanitarian crisis exists in Greece.

On the basis of the criteria and the data of the EU, Greece is a country in serious poverty. In 2011, 31.4% of the population, or 3.4 million people, lived on an income below 60% of the national median disposable income. At the same time, 27.3% of the population, or 1.3 million people, were at risk of poverty. There is no data yet for 2012, though things have certainly got worse.

Using further EU indicators, a large proportion of Greek households currently live in conditions of "material deprivation". A little more than 11% actually live in "extreme material deprivation", which means without enough heating, electricity, and use of either a car or a telephone. It also means having a poor diet, devoid of meat or fish on a weekly basis, as well as total or partial inability to meet emergency expenses or payments for rent and bills.

The ineffectiveness of European programmes for reintegrating the unemployed into the labour market and the lack of national social protection programmes have pushed Greece even further down the ranks of poverty. The adult unemployment rate stood at 26.8% in October 2012. This level, although huge in comparison to the recent past, still does not give the whole picture.

It misses, for instance, unemployment resulting from the failure of thousands of small businesses. To the unemployed should be added the working poor, ie, workers with such low wages that they cannot meet basic needs. At 13% of the workforce they represent the highest proportion of the working poor in the eurozone.

There are three more indicators that point to a humanitarian crisis. First, the number of homeless people has risen to unprecedented levels for a European country: unofficial estimates put them at 40,000. Second, the proportion of Greek beneficiaries of NGO medical services in some urban centres was recorded at 60% of the total in 2012. This would have been unthinkable even three years ago, since such services were typically provided to immigrants, not Greeks.

Third, there has been explosive growth in soup kitchens and general food distribution. The levels are not officially recorded, but the Church of Greece distributes approximately 250,000 daily rations, while there are unknown numbers of rations distributed by municipal authorities and NGOs. By recent government order, municipal rations will be expanded further because of rising incidence of children fainting at school due to low calorie intake. There will also be light meals provided to young students.

The evidence of poverty, inequality, and inability to access primary services confirms the increasingly desperate statements by people at the frontline. The country has become a field of humanitarian action, and should be treated as such. It is shameful for the Greek government and the EU to turn a blind eye to it. The international humanitarian community should respond with urgency.