Greek police used teargas on anti-austerity protesters in Athens on Wednesday, as thousands of demonstrators marched toward parliament amid a 24-hour nationwide strike.
As Greece struggles to pay back overwhelming amounts of bailout
loans, journalist and documentary maker Aris Chatzistefanou says
the country is facing an even bigger issue.
“When you have huge debt like the one that Greece and other
countries in the European periphery are facing, you start losing
levels of democracy and I’m afraid that has happened,” he told
RT.
Chatzistefanou spoke to RT about Wednesday’s protests and the wider
picture regarding Greece’s ongoing economic woes.
RT:Workers in Greece are steadfast in trying to force
the government to get rid of the bailout deal, but is there any
other way to help the economy?
Aris Chatzistefanou: Many progressive economists have said
for the last two or three years that these austerity measures will
create not only social genocide in Greece, but they will destroy
the infrastructure of the economy. And now we are talking about
debt that is still increasing after three austerity packages. And
if everything goes as planned, we will have a debt of 175 per cent
of GDP. Don’t forget that before the IMF and the troika
intervention in Greece, we had a debt of 115 per cent. So it’s
exactly these austerity measures that create the problem.
There are many alternative plans for example, default, because
everyone knows that right now it’s impossible to repay a huge debt
like that – even if we accept that it’s legal. And many people say
that it’s not legal. That it’s illegal. Many other economists have
spoken about exiting the eurozone. Even Paul Krugman has
characterized the eurozone as a straightjacket for Greece which
created this huge debt to the economy.
RT:These are big figures we’re talking about. And we see
pictures here of protesters. Either way, the protests in Greece
have turned violent many times over these recessionary years. How
are things in Athens looking, where you are?
AC: Today we had one of the biggest demonstrations in the
past five years, with organizers saying it exceeded 100,000 people.
It was mainly a peaceful demonstration in Athens but I’m receiving
now some message of small clashes in parts of Athens with police
using teargas and some protesters reacting by throwing stones and
fire bombs to the police. But I think we should keep that it was a
mainly peaceful demonstration and one of the biggest of the last
five years or so. I’m saying that because we will see in the news
tonight only the clashes with the police, which is not the main
message of what happened today in Athens and other cities in
Greece.
RT:In a wider sense, you’ve described the situation in
Greece as a ‘debtocracy.’ Do you mean the crisis has now somehow
become a political regime?
AC: With the title of our documentary, Debtocracy, we wanted
to explain that when you have huge debt like the one that Greece
and other countries in the European periphery are facing, you start
losing levels of democracy and I’m afraid that has happened. Don’t
forget that one year ago, we had a non-elected prime minister and
after the election we have a government that promised to
renegotiate the debt but never did. They only invest in riot police
and unconstitutional bills that impose more austerity in the
country. I’m afraid we are becoming a third world country, not only
as far as the economy is concerned, but also as far as democracy is
concerned.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.