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Greeks told protests could derail bail-out
By Kerin Hope
Α.Γεωργίου (ΕΛΣΤΑΤ): Οι καταλήψεις τινάζουν στον αέρα τις προθεσμίες για την έκτη δόση
Σε δήλωση του στους Financial Times ο κ.Γεωργίου είπε ότι δεν θα είναι δυνατόν η ΕΛΣΤΑΤ να παρέχει στην τρόικα τα απαραίτητα στοιχεία για τον υπολογισμό του προϋπολογισμού του 2012λόγω της απεργίας.
«Θα χάσουμε την προθεσμία που λήγει το βράδυ για να αποστείλουμε τα τελικά στοιχεία για το χρέος και το έλλειμμα του 2010 στην Τρόικα επειδή η ομάδα μου δεν μπορεί να εισέλθει στο κτίριο και να τελειώσει τη δουλειά», φέρεται να δήλωσε.
Greeks told protests could derail bail-out
By Kerin Hope
The head of Greece’s statistical agency has lashed out against a wildcat strike by employees,warning the protest could derail the approval by international lenders of the next tranche of the country’s bail-out loan.
Andreas Georgiou, chairman of Elstat (Hellenic Statistical Agency), told the Financial Times on Friday that he could not provide the figures needed to finalise the 2012 budget because of the walk-out.
“We will miss tonight’s deadline for sending final updated debt and deficit figures for 2010 to Eurostat [the EU statistical agency] because I and my team can’t get into the building to finish the job,” he said.
He said the figures were urgently needed for the troika to recalibrate the draft budget before it goes to parliament on Monday, “but it will take another two to three days of work to complete them”.
The troika is reviewing Greece’s latest attempt to reinvigorate fiscal and structural reforms, including another €6bn of budget cuts, before deciding whether to release the next €8bn tranche of the current bail-out loan.
Elstat’s union has blocked access to the agency building in an Athens industrial suburb since Tuesday in the latest round of a campaign apparently aimed at undermining Mr Georgiou’s efforts to bring Greek statistics in line with EU standards after years of fudging by successive governments.
Striking civil servants blockaded government buildings on Friday including the finance, transport and health ministries, in order to prevent troika officials from collecting data needed for the current review.
“We’re fighting against cuts in public sector jobs, salaries and allowances by the troika . . . They should go home,” said a finance ministry employee, referring to plans to cut 30,000 jobs within weeks and launch a unified payment system for public sector employees.
Mr Georgiou, a former IMF official, was hired by the government last year under the terms of the country’s EU-IMF bail-out with a brief to set up an independent statistical agency.
Producing accurate statistics is key to restoring Greece’s credibility with international lenders. The country’s debt crisis erupted two years ago after the newly elected Socialist government revealed the budget deficit would be three times higher than earlier forecasts.
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