The resignation of Stergios Kalpakis from his position as SYRIZA secretary is nothing more than confirmation that things at Koumoundourou are now heading toward dissolution. His decision to resign obviously did not catch his comrades by surprise, as throughout the recent period Stergios Kalpakis had been pressuring Socrates Famellos to take initiatives that would extract the party from the difficult position it finds itself in today. These initiatives obviously concern Alexis Tsipras’s emerging party, as well as how cooperation with SYRIZA can proceed. This is because most of the Koumoundourou officials believe that even without positions and chairs, the solution lies with the former prime minister’s party.
SYRIZA: Famellos’s plan for a unifying progressive scheme and the disagreements
Socrates Famellos, on the other hand, appears not to be rushing to make moves and insists on his proposal for cooperation among progressive forces with Louka Katseli, Nikos Kotzias, Petros Kokkalis – and naturally Alexis Tsipras. On Tuesday in his interview he mentioned that “SYRIZA is doing everything it can so that there will be a candidate scheme, a ballot, that will be unifying. SYRIZA will be in the next elections within a unifying scheme, it will be expressed through a unifying progressive scheme.” This view, however, is contrary to what Alexis Tsipras has said, who has made it clear that he will not cooperate with other party entities, but only with personalities.
Socrates Famellos’s hesitation to clarify things obviously intensifies the anxiety of officials, who realize that SYRIZA risks finding itself outside Parliament and returning to the state it was in before Alexis Tsipras took the party’s reins. Information suggests, moreover, that several of the party’s new officials have decided through their stance to show SYRIZA’s president that the margins are specific and that he should do something as soon as possible.
Kalpakis’s messages in the resignation letter
Stergios Kalpakis spoke by phone with Socrates Famellos before making his resignation public and informed him of his decision. SYRIZA officials, however, point out that immediately after the announcement of the new political entity on May 26 by Alexis Tsipras, Socrates Famellos should proceed with the moves that the party’s Central Committee and Political Secretariat have authorized him to make. At the same time, Amalias remains silent, as Tsipras’s side officials do not want to get involved in what has been happening lately in SYRIZA for any reason.
Meanwhile, Stergios Kalpakis clarified in his letter that his resignation is not related to the next parliamentary elections, as he will not be a candidate. He also requested the convening of the party’s Central Committee on the first weekend of June in order to make specific decisions. In the resignation text he also mentions that 10 months after his election to the secretary position, “the party’s political plan has been overturned by reality itself.” He adds that the conference decisions of PASOK and New Left “canceled the possibility of a progressive electoral alliance or a common progressive ballot” and mainly Alexis Tsipras’s upcoming party foundation “created completely new conditions in our space.”
“Early on, from the beginning of the year and subsequently before the March Central Committee, I had asked to have a picture of Alexis Tsipras’s plan, foreseeing the danger, as time passes, that the party would reach a point where it could not implement any plan. I was not heard. In the last month -repeatedly and publicly this time- I asked for faster moves toward convergence. Even today, just one week before Alexis Tsipras’s announcements, we have no picture of the possibilities and probabilities of convergence.”
He also emphasized: “This situation cannot continue any longer, much more so when for so many months I have warned about the dangers and dead ends and even today the data are not known. At the same time, I believe that the last thing SYRIZA-PS needs today is introversion with a confrontation between President and Secretary. For these reasons, with this letter I submit my resignation from the position of Central Committee Secretary, hoping that it will function to the degree appropriate to it as a distress signal for accelerating developments.”
The Polakis case and Famellos’s message
At the same time the issue of Pavlos Polakis seems to have subsided, although Socrates Famellos clarified in his Tuesday interview that “his expulsion was a justified and expected choice.” He also expressed his complete disapproval of Dimitris Chatzisokratis’s proposal, which triggered Pavlos Polakis’s post before his expulsion. As he said: “I reject it categorically, it is unacceptable. There is no discussion of dissolution, suspension of operation, resignation in SYRIZA which has turned a new page and attempts to intervene in the public scene. Unacceptable is any discussion about SYRIZA’s assets, such a reading has nothing to do with our political identity. We don’t do politics for the chairs.”
The Chania MP, however, sees Alexis Tsipras behind all of Famellos’s moves, as information suggests he believes there is a secret agreement between the two men.
