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Antenna News in English 060996
News in English, of 06/09/1996
TITLES
- The president welcomes foreign political leaders of
Greek descent.
The prime minister says Athens new airport will be
ready in 5 years.
- And, villagers just say no to politicians.
STEPHANOPOULOS
President Kostis Stephanopoulos met with the
parliamentary deputies from 16 countries Thursday.
"Turkey avoids taking its claims against Greece to
the international court because its claims are
groundless", he told them. "Despite that", he added,
"Turkey threatens and questions Greek sovereignty at
sea and on land, in areas where Greek sovereignty is
indisputable. It claims small Greek islands, saying
they fall into a legal "grey zone".
The Greek president also talked about Greek relations
with the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, or
Fyrom. He said Fyrom's attempt to get itself
recognised under the Greek name of "Macedonia" is an
aggressive tactic. He added that Fyrom has violated
the terms of an accord it signed with Greece last
year, calling for the two sides to negotiate an
acceptable compromise name for Fyrom.
Greece places great stock in the efforts
of Greeks in other countries to promote Greece's
national interests. Mr Stephanpoulos told his
guests that the lack of understanding Greece's
allies sometimes show toward Greece is partly
due to ignorance of the issues, and partly to
the fact that self-interest often takes
precedence over right in international
relations.
AIRPORT
Athens new international airport - to be named after Elevtherios
Venizelos - will be ready for
take-offs and landings by the year 2001.
The prime minister laid the ceremonial foundation
at the construction site Thursday.
At the ground-breaking ceremony, Kostas
Simitis said the airport construction is a major
project, which will act as a catalyst to the Greek
economy over the next several years.
All of Greece's political parties agree that the
many European-Union funded infrastructure
projects planned for Greece will be an integral part
of the country's economic resurgence.
At the ceremony, public works minister Kostas
Laliotis said the numerous public works on the table or underway
will change the face of Greece.
New Democracy members at the airport ceremony had
complaints.
MP Tzannis Tzannetakis said his party had a
contract to build the airport ready three years
ago, but its government fell before it was
signed. If it had been signed, he said, planes
would already be landing at the new airport.
MP Stephanos Manos quipped, "The Pasok
government hasn't done anything in three years -
well, let it have this ceremony. The Greek
people aren't being fooled".
EVERT
Miltiades Evert says his party's ticket is a winning
one. In his letter, he calls on all party members to
be active in campaigning for the party, in getting
the party's message out to every corner of the
country.
New Democracy has truth on its side, he tells the
party's candidates - calm dialogue with the
opposition is therefore its strong card.
MP Thodoris Kassimis agrees. He says that for the
past several days, the prime minister has been
lagging behind, trying to catch up with the Evert
campaign.
"Evert announced his pre-election platform of
economic reforms", he says. We've been talking
about them for 20 months. "After Evert's
announcement, Simtis suddenly remembered the need
for economic measures, after three years of a Pasok
government".
The economy has so far been at the forefront of
discussion in New Democracy in the run-up to the
election.
MP Niki Tzavela responded to honorary party leader
Constantinos Mitsotakis's assertion that
privatisation - a New Democracy policy - will
lead to termperary increases in unemployment.
Tzavela says that's not true, if the sell-offs and
restructuring are handled correctly.
Panos Kammenos talked about another issue related to
unemployment: immigration. He said undocumented
foreign workers should be made to leave the country,
so Greeks can find work.
TSOCHATZOPOULOS
New Democracy isn't the only one confident it'll win the upcoming
elections. Interor minister Akis
Tsochatzopoulos stumped in Thessaloniki Thursday.
He said Pasok will win the contest.
Tsochatzopoulos said Pasok is well-equipped by the legacy of the
late Andreas Papandreou for its electoral battle.
He added that Greece needs stability after the elections, and
stability is what Pasok guarantees.
His party has secured political and financial
staiblity since it was elected in 1993, he
pointed out, paving the way to economic growth of 2 per cent a
year.
After a Pasok victory, growth will increase next year, he
predicted, inflation will fall to under 7 per cent, and the
public debt will be reduced.
development : it increased the GNP over 2%.
Tsochatzopoulos predicted that next year the GNP
will be further increased, while the inflation
will be decreased below 7% as well as the public
debt.
FARMERS
One of the main issues so far in campaign '96 has been the plight
of the nation's farmers. New
Democracy has pledged to ease the tax burden on
farmers within 30 days of getting elected. The prime minister
has also pledged to take steps to encourage farmers who can't
make ends meet, stay on their farms.
The farmers have been up in arms since Pasok took power,
complaining that their production costs are
too high. They want taxes on production-related
goods cut. They also complain that the prices
they get for their produce are too low.
VIDEO SPEAKAGE OF...
As they have done so often these past three years, farmers in
central Greece took their tractors out
in protest over the government's agricultural policies Thursday.
Once again, they're demanding higher prices for their crops.
Thursday morning the centre of Larisa was clogged by tractors.
It was the same story in Trikala and
Karditsa. The farmers cut off the main highway
between Larisa and Thessaloniki for an hour
Thursday afternoon.
VILLAGERS
The banner in the village of Perdikaki in central
Greece says it all: "We'll never vote again if our
road isn't improved".
Residents of Perdikaki and Vrouviana are boycotting
the upcoming elections - that means 3 thousand lost
votes.
Giorgos Dimovassilis, chairman of Perdikaki's
local council, explains:
"MPs come here every four years to make promises.
Now the people here want to wake up the slumbering
beast of the state, the parties, the politicians,
and get them to take take care of the country, which
has been abandoned and is being deserted".
Residents want the dirt road connecting the village
to the surrounding region, to be paved. It's been
half-finished since 1963.
One villager says the road's so bad he couldn't get
his wife to the hospital in time...she gave birth
on the road.
Residents say they won't receive any politicians in
their villages until the road is completed.
And that goes for the village of Koumaria, near
Ioannina, too. They have a banner there that
reads: "Our village does not accept politicians!!!"
They also want a small part of the road that links
their village to the the larger road to Ioannina,
paved.
In Strongylovouni, a village near Agrinio, residents
handed their voting books over to the officials in
protest. They want the primary school, merged with
another school in a nearby village, to be re-
opened.
Local council leader Ilias Kotsonas says they're
refusing to vote unless the school re-opens. If it
doesn't, they won't let our kids attend any school
next year.
SMALL PARTIES
The candidates may not be welcome in some villages, but the
politicians are on the campaign road
wherever it's open.
Political Spring leader Antonis Samaras visits Crete on Friday.
Left Coalition president Nikos Konstantopoulos
speaks in Komotini up north, also on Friday. And
Democratic Movement leader Dimitris Tsovolas will
be stumping in another northern town, Kavala.
Communist party secretary Aleka Papariga announced
the main points of her platform at a press conference Thursday.
Her party's goals are to put an end to the government's economic
austerity programmes, and to
get Greece to reject the terms of the Maastricht
Treaty for European Unification. Papariga says
the terms of that treaty are too tough
economically on the Greek people.
Papariga also complained that the election campaign is being
treated like a two-horse race, the horses being Pasok and New
Democracy. Everyone
is simply being asked to bet on who will come in
first, she said.
LIANI
Dimitra Papandreou, widow of the late Andreas
Papandreou, denies that she gave an interview to a
Spanish magazine.
The alleged interview with "Campio 16" was re-
published in a Greek newspaper.
In a written a statement, Mrs Papandreou says, "Just a few months
after the loss of my beloved husband, I'm not in the position or
the mood to do something like give an interview. The rule I go
by is to respect the memory of Andreas Papandreou.
In the alleged interview, Mrs Papandreou says that Andreas
Papandreou's children are cold and distant
toward her.
But Dimitra Papandreou says she's never even heard of the
magazine.
JOKE
The latest in our series of humourous stories from the world of
politics during this campaign season
comes from Libya.
Pasok MP Giorgos Katsifaras tells Antenna a drink can cause
misunderstandings even in the world of politics.
"It was 1979 or 1980", Katsifaras recalls. Pasok president
Andreas Papandreou and many of his
associates were in Libya at the invitaion of
Moamar Kaddafi.
At the hotel, Papandreou invited us all into his suite for a
drink.
Some of the members of our entourage showed up late to the
cocktail party. They never learned
that Papandreou had brought pre-mixed screwdrivers with him,
knowing that alcohol is forbidden in Libya.
At brekfast the next morning, one member of the entourage said
after tasting his orange juice that
they'd served one type of juice the previous day, and another
type at breakfast.
Papandreou laughed at the observation. But later, Katsifaras had
some more fun. He told the man that
the drink they'd had the first day wasn't orange
juice, but something called "citron".
When the confused traveller ordered citron at breakfast the next
day, the waiter looked blankly at him. Katsifaras consoled his
friend, saying "The waiter just doesn't understand English".
© ANT1-Radio 1996
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