Ministers in ‘virtual reality’
The worst thing that can happen to a minister is to be trapped in a kind of “virtual reality.” To be convinced that signing a ministerial decision or passing a bill automatically solves a problem that afflicts thousands of citizens, and insist on this idea because the circle of sycophants and pencil pushers that surrounds him has truly clouded his judgment. Citizens who protest over the state of affairs are seen as grumpy, partisan, conspiracy theorists or unworthy of a response.
And then you read the messages sent to you by very serious people who are caught up in bureaucracy by various impractical or incomprehensible decisions. They are not conspiracy theorists, they do not belong to extreme parties. They are just desperate. Especially those who take laws and amendments seriously and try to do everything by the book. They read the law requiring landowners to clear their property of combustible materials so as to prevent fires, they pay the associated costs, and then find themselves in a bureaucratic labyrinth. When they call a state agency to complain about the confusion, they hear an employee tell them: “Well don’t worry that much, it’s not like the fines will be imposed. They use them for intimidation.” In short, you try to do things right and end up feeling like an idiot. But it happens often in many transactions with the state.
I remember a few years ago when I had a difficult moment with a relative in the emergency room of a public hospital. The self-sacrifice of the doctors and nurses was admirable. But the hospital looked like it was in a third world country. Patients crammed onto portable gurneys in a corridor with an open window letting in the freezing air. When I made the mistake of commenting on this incident in my column I received a phone call explaining that I had not seen well, I had not experienced what I experienced, no, no. I felt angry but quickly realized that my interlocutor was not mocking me. He was convinced that he was right, perhaps even believed that emergency rooms in a Greek public hospital are similar to those in a Danish public hospital.
It is very important that we are all on the same page, that we listen and keep our eyes open to what the normal, average Greek citizen experiences. In journalism, we understood this during the economic crisis. We forgot to listen and understand that, on the one hand, we need fiscal discipline but, on the other, we could not ignore the person who can’t turn on the radiator because it costs too much.
For a politician, especially a minister, it is important to have a first-hand experience of what is happening, and also to understand how much anger is created when they insist on things that are simply not true.
