The Memorandum is the Finance Minister’s… Manifesto

 

AKEL C.C. Press Spokesman Georgios Loucaides, 24/2/2014

 

The relevant statements made by the Minister of Finance to the British daily newspaper “Daily Telegraph” that the “We’re aligned with the Troika…The memorandum could have been our own manifesto. It’s a chance to correct our own shortcomings, and do what should have been done in Cyprus long ago” are on their own quite revealing about the government’s true positions.

The government and the ruling forces cannot, but neither wants any more to hide their joy about the Memorandum’s content.

They cannot, but neither do they want to conceal their complete ideological identification with the Troika and the neo-liberal policies of severe austerity.

They have of course every right to consider the Memorandum as their own ideological and political manifesto. What they do not have the right to do is mock the Cypriot people, before and after the election, that they would supposedly negotiate the Memorandum’s content and that allegedly they would be assertive towards the Troika, that they would not accept privatisations and that they would supposedly protect the welfare state and working people’s rights and gains.

In addition, it would be useful if the government and ruling forces backing it know that society and citizens, regardless of party affiliations, do not consider the Memorandum yoke as the ideological manifesto that should have been implemented in any case and regardless of the Troika’s presence here.