EU deal will need big majority
A new bailout for Greece, currently being hammered out by European Union leaders as part of a broader rescue package for the bloc, will need a qualified majority of at least 180 in Greece?s 300-seat Parliament, Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos suggested on Monday after telephoning opposition party leaders from Brussels to brief them on the progress of talks at an EU summit.
Asked by reporters late on Monday whether the government would seek a qualified majority when the rescue package reached in Brussels is put to a vote in Greece?s Parliament, Venizelos said that ?such matters must be addressed with a heightened sense of responsibility and if possible voted through Parliament with a broad majority, not because this is a legal requirement but because it is a national imperative and political responsibility.?
The minister added that he had briefed party leaders on ?the framework of negotiations, the basic figures, the crucial issues, the priorities and the risks.?
Earlier in the day, the leader of the rightwing Popular Orthodox Rally (LAOS), Giorgos Karatzaferis had indicated, in an interview on Mega television channel, that the government was planning to seek 180 votes for any deal reached in Brussels, instead of a simple majority of 151.
Prime Minister George Papandreou made no statements on Monday on his return to Athens from Brussels where he had stressed on Sunday that the debt problem was not Greek but European. On Tuesday Papandreou is to brief President Karolos Papoulias on progress in the debt talks before returning to Brussels for an emergency EU summit tomorrow which is expected to produce some sort of solution to Greece?s debt problem and set up a firewall against the crisis for the bloc as a whole.
According to sources, EU leaders have agreed on two things — a haircut for holders of Greek sovereign debt to the tune of at least 50 percent and the recapitalization of the European banking system.
Sources told Kathimerini that Venizelos had referred to a ?radical haircut? that would not be big enough, however, to threaten the stability of the Greek economy.
