The revelations from conversations included in new court documents regarding the OPEKEPE scandal sparked fierce confrontation between the government and opposition, while the clash also included Prime Minister Mitsotakis’s announcements about implementing incompatibility between minister and MP positions after the 2027 elections.
Parliamentary clash over OPEKEPE and minister-MP incompatibility: Dimitris Mantzos speaks of “hypocrisy” – Dimitris Markopoulos responds
PASOK parliamentary spokesperson Dimitris Mantzos commented on the prime minister’s message, speaking of “hypocrisy” while launching an attack on the government, saying that while it condemns the clientelist practices that existed in the past, it has simultaneously built “its own system for serving scandals.” Referring to the agricultural subsidies scandal, he argued that the governing majority relied on organizational gaps and emphasized that digitization was deliberately not advanced so that “the windows that became doors for fraudsters to pass through would not close.” He simultaneously attacked the government, saying that now that “the bill is coming from Europe,” it appears surprised. He also spoke of “incompetence, inadequacy, corruption and lack of transparency,” and called for early elections so that the demand for political change could gain substance.
Dimitris Markopoulos, MP for Piraeus B’, responded to Mantzos’s attacks, saying that Kyriakos Mitsotakis acknowledged the existence of mistakes by acting “immediately and institutionally.” He also spoke of hypocrisy from the opposition’s side, noting that the “infallible” must be sought elsewhere. Escalating his attack on PASOK, he said “you are Tsochatzopoulos’s grandchildren and Kaili’s first cousins. You will not point fingers in this faction.” He also asked the main opposition to take a position on the minister-MP incompatibility proposal, which he characterized as “institutional, radical and revolutionary.” Referring to early election scenarios, he replied mockingly that the opposition cannot even agree on a joint no-confidence motion.
Doudonis: Mitsotakis attempts “constitutional fakery”
Later, PASOK MP Panagiotis Doudonis launched a fierce attack on the government over Mitsotakis’s proposal. Doudonis accused the prime minister of attempting “constitutional fakery,” emphasizing that the provision for replacing a minister-MP with a runner-up and their return to Parliament strengthens, rather than limits, clientelist relationships. According to Doudonis, this creates a “favor competition” between minister and runner-up, speaking of an “invisible hand of the clientelist market.”
Gianoulis: Prime minister’s “sad” performance
SYRIZA parliamentary spokesperson Christos Gianoulis described Kyriakos Mitsotakis’s appearance as “sad,” accusing the prime minister of a hypocritical fight against corruption. According to Gianoulis, the prime minister presented an image of the country “that apparently only he lives in.” According to SYRIZA’s parliamentary spokesperson, the OPEKEPE scandal revealed a mechanism for securing electoral clientele through non-transparent practices “that sometimes touch the limits of corruption,” attributing to the prime minister the role of “moral perpetrator.” Finally, New Left parliamentary spokesperson Nasos Iliopoulos said “you have turned the country into the best client of the European prosecutor’s office.”
