Major powers successfully dictate regime change in Greece
Just three days after he won a vote of confidence, Greece’s Prime Minister George Papandreou is out of office and a government of “national unity” is being formed—combining Papandreou's PASOK and the main conservative opposition, New Democracy.
The sole raison d'être of the new government is to impose on the Greek people savage austerity measures, which the global speculators, the European Union and Washington decided Papandreou was now unable to accomplish.
Papandreou was faced with massive popular opposition to the measures tied to the latest tranche of loans from the troika—the EU, International Monetary Fund and European Central Bank. These include lowering the income tax threshold from €12,000 to €5,000, raising value-added tax and the retirement age, slashing pensions by up to 40 percent, cutting wages by 30 percent and further job losses. Mass opposition culminated in a two day general strike October 19 and 20 that witnessed the largest protest since the fall of the military junta in 1974.
Seeking to force the opposition parties and the trade unions to abandon their token opposition and rally behind a national effort to impose austerity, Papandreou announced plans to hold a referendum on the issue. The financial elite responded with the worst run on world markets since 2008, while ruling circles in Berlin and Paris decided that Papandreou had shown himself to be irresolute.
Even after abandoning his referendum demand, Papandreou was told to go by German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy.
The confidence vote passed late Friday had the aim of forestalling demands by New Democracy for early elections that would also cut across ratification of the austerity measures.
