Athens George Papandreou, the Greek Prime Minister, said yesterday that his country was fighting for survival against bankruptcy and urged civil servants and pensioners to accept sacrifices to save the debt-burdened nation.
In a dramatic speech to his Socialist PASOK party on the eve of a Cabinet meeting expected to approve new austerity measures, Papandreou said: “I will fight to save the fatherland from whatever the nightmare possibility of bankruptcy might entail.”
Under pressure to meet European Union demands to find up to €4.8 billion in additional savings before he visits Germany on Friday, he played up the risk of default, saying speculators had made borrowing costs prohibitive.
“If anyone thinks that this is a remote nightmare scenario, they don’t realise what the situation is,” he said. “Each day we discover new holes, new landmines, in the budget deficit.” Mr Papandreou did not spell out specific measures but he said public employees would have to get by on less, and the state could not go on subsidising pensions. That could hurt two of PASOK’s key support bases.
“We need to take tough decisions, decisions that can be unfair,” he declared.
Government sources said that measures under consideration included raising value added tax, cutting public sector pay, freezing pensions and introducing higher duties on fuel, tobacco, alcohol and luxury goods.
Thursday 4 March 2010
Bankruptcy stalks Greece, says Prime Minister George Papandreou
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