Main opposition PASOK-KINAL leader Nikos Androulakis was searing in his criticism of the prime minister in an interview on Wednesday night with the public television channel ERTnews, during the programme 'Sto Kentro', regarding the scandal involving OPEKEPE, the Greek authority for EU agricultural aid payments.
He noted that in each of the major issues that the government had faced, such as the tragic train collision at Tempi, the wire tapping scandal, the excessively high prices and most recently the scandal with OPEKEPE, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis had blamed ingrained "systemic failures", and added: "Does the country have a prime minister? Does the country have a government? Does Mr. Mitsotakis have responsibility? Mr. Mitsotakis covered for a criminal New Democracy gang."
Androulakis commented that the prime minister tried to claim he had no knowledge of what was happening but that he had raised the issue of OPEKEPE personally, through two questions tabled by PASOK in 2020 and again in 2023, about the successive resignations and changes of leadership there, as well as citing newspaper articles about senior executives who had reported problems to the premier's office.