Editorial Ta Nea: Throwing in the towel

In his interview with Open television yesterday, Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras admitted for the first time what everyone else has been saying – that the government’s problem is political and not only a matter of numbers.

Of course, the PM expressed the conviction that his junior coalition partner, Defence Minister Panos Kammenos, will continue to support the government in parliament.

What is important, however, is not that supposed certainty, but rather what the PM said he would do if his partner withdraws his support, which is to call elections if he loses his pariamentary majority.

Yesterday it became clear that the prime minister has definitively lost the ability to call the shots with inititiatives on the political stage.

Essentially, he admitted that he is in an exceptionally difficult position, and yesterday it became clear that the prime minister has definitively lost the ability to call the shots with inititiatives on the political stage.

It would be a grave error if he were to attempt to extend his stay in power by bending to the dictates of his partner or by seeking the scatterred votes of MPs in order to maintain his parliamentary majority. By doing so, the PM would transform the arithmetic and political problem into an institutional one.

The leader of the SYRIZA-Independent Greeks government yesterday threw in the towel.

Having for the first time acknowledged the political nature of the problem with which the government is confronted, he now has a duty to put in motion the procedures that will transcend the apparent impasse.

In democracies, after all, the citizens have the last word.