The future of Greece is ominous: "if Putin does not stop the war, Maduro will not send us oil"

Constantly rising electricity and fuel prices, double-digit inflation over the past few months (expected to reach 12% in May) – Greek households and businesses are in despair.

But what is the Conservative government doing to bring the situation under control, other than giving out promises in the form of subsidies? A little… “If Putin doesn’t stop the war, and if Maduro doesn’t send us oil, the future of Greece is predicted to be ominous…,” writes journalist Giorgos Karelias in an opinion piece published on the news website news24/7.gr on Tuesday 7 June 2022

“The terms of so-called terrorism (shock and awe, hurricane, perfect storm, etc.) that characterize the current energy, economic and food crisis are not ours. Nor were they invented by some outsider. They are used by American experts who say the current crisis is worse than the corresponding oil crisis of the 1970s.

Why? Because then we only had an oil crisis. And today we have a triple one: oil, gas and electricity.

And what will happen if you do not do something that can somehow stop this current before the onset of winter?

What was that? The predictors themselves speak of a diplomatic decision by Ukraine, an end to the war and the lifting of sanctions against Russia.

Who will do it? The Americans have other goals: to crush Russia financially and overthrow Putin. And all this without taking into account the possibility of an acute food crisis that will bring hunger to the poorest regions of the planet.

And what is Europe doing with all this? It is torn between sanctions against Russia and benefits that it gives to those countries that threaten to veto. Macron, Scholz and Draghi chant something about “the need to end the war and restore some energy balance”, but that’s about it. There is no plan for what seems to be coming.

And what happens in Greece?

First, the Mitsotakis government boasts of being on the “right side of history.” But the energy crisis is hitting us hard, as evidenced by the constant spikes in electricity prices.

Second, why is this happening? Is the crisis just imported? Not really. The Mitsotakis government hastened to hold a delignification championship without any serious alternative plans. The Prime Minister announced that all lignite power plants will close in 2028, despite the fact that the “poor” Germans planned to do this in 2036. Greek triumph….

Greece has a huge dependence on gas, and everyone understands what this means now that gas prices have skyrocketed due to sanctions in Russia. All this was done without any serious plan to replace fossil fuels with renewables, as Spain and Portugal did. Of course, now that everything has become tougher, the brown coal power plants have been returned to work so that we don’t have power outages in the summer, when tourism is in full swing.

Thirdly, Greece has some of the highest electricity prices in Europe because its government has found it wise to purchase 100% of its purchases from the famous Dutch Energy Stock Exchange (“poor” Germans only buy 30% there). Thus, Greek consumers, households and businesses fall prey to energy vampires who make fortunes and dare not do the obvious: set a price ceiling.

Fourth, in the midst of all this, the Mitsotakis government is berserk: when it denounces the opposition’s “populism” for lowering the value-added tax, when government ministers leave that option open without following the public opinion poll. Finance ministers know that after 43 billion euros wasted on the pandemic to keep the government from losing its lead in the polls, “there is no other fiscal space until the end of 2022.” It means “no money”.

Nevertheless, money must be found, because otherwise the summer cannot be won politically with consumers brandishing outrageous energy bills. And therefore, the prime minister will not be able to call early elections in the fall if he sees that the coming winter will be hard and unbearable.

So, unless Putin has a hand in stopping the war, and unless Maduro sends us fleets full of oil, we won’t see anything on the horizon…”

Original publication in Greek

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