Unions, but also lawmakers in Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras’ leftist Syriza party, chafe at a raft of tax hikes and pension reforms that must be passed in the vote on Wednesday if bailout talks with worldwide lenders are to start.
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Large numbers of Syriza politicians are nearly certain to vote against the package, though the Bill is expected to pass with support from pro-European opposition parties.
Tsipras has faced strident dissent even from top ministers, with Energy Minister Panagiotis Lafazanis saying in a post on his ministry’s website that the deal the prime minister reached was “unacceptable” and calling on him to withdraw it.
Dissenters argued that Greeks could not face any more cuts after six years of recession that saw a sharp rise in poverty and unemployment.
The 38 lawmakers who stayed true to Syriza’s pledge of no new cuts included former Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis, who stepped down last week in hopes of improving relations with global creditors after 60 percent of voters had rejected new austerity in a referendum.
Eurozone finance ministers will hold a conference call on Thursday to discuss the latest developments in Greece, a day after Athens is set to vote through tough reforms in return for a bailout, a Eurogroup spokesman said.
Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras managed to push through a series of unpopular reforms demanded by the country’s worldwide creditors, despite scenes of anger over austerity in Athens, where protesters threw firebombs at police.
He criticized the deal, but said it was the best Greece could get. Some 30 lawmakers from the ruling Syriza party have threatened to oppose the document.
For two weeks now, Greek banks have been shut, with increasingly desperate depositors limited to daily withdrawals of 60 euros ($67) from cash machines. It was a decision that will weigh on me for the rest of my life.’ said.
A missed payment to the ECB could prompt the central bank to stop providing emergency funding to Greece’s cash-starved banks.
The vote came after an anti-austerity demonstration by about 12,000 protesters outside parliament degenerated into violence as the debate was getting underway Wednesday night. It is imperative to state that the conditions of the bailout are against all of Tsipras’s pre-election promises to repeal the budget austerity.
The debate will go down as one of the most significant and freaky in Greek political history after Mr Tsipras admitted that he did not believe in the bailout package.
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If a country defaults on an EFSM loan, the losses would potentially come out of the EU Budget, which includes all 28 countries, rather than just the 19 Euro members.
