Focus on Greece Investment Immigration and focus on business and trade in Greece: On June 11, Samaras suddenly announced the closure of the Hellenic Broadcasting Corporation (ERT) and the dismissal of all 2,656 employees, leading to the most severe crisis in Greece since the new government took office a year ago. The Democratic Left, the smallest party in Greece's three-party coalition government, announced its withdrawal from the coalition last Friday. The main ruling party, New Democracy, and its remaining coalition partner, PASOK, joined forces on the 24th to reshuffle the cabinet.
PASOK leader Venizelos became the biggest winner of this political struggle, taking office as Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs in the new cabinet.
Venizelos served as Minister of Finance in the previous Papandreou government and took over as party leader after the defeat in last year's general election. To make room for Venizelos, Foreign Minister Avramopoulos was transferred to Minister of National Defence, while Minister of National Defence Panagiotopoulos was transferred to Minister of Culture. Consistent with external predictions, Minister of Finance Stournaras and Minister of Development Hatzidakis were both retained.
The coalition government formed by New Democracy and PASOK has a majority of only 3 seats in parliament, holding 153 out of 300 seats. Although the Democratic Left party and some independent members of parliament are expected to support the new government in key bill votes, it may be even more difficult to pass unpopular reforms and austerity packages in the future.
In fact, one of the main reasons Samaras decided to close the bloated state television station was to give international creditors an account as soon as possible and fulfill the commitment to cut 2,000 public sector employees by June 30; the resulting uproar forced Samaras to compromise: allowing up to 2,000 employees to continue working as temporary contract workers until the new television station is up and running, and at that time, at least 1,000 people will return to their posts.
Aristides N. Hatzis, an associate professor at the University of Athens, expects that the two-party government may instead be more decisive in introducing unpopular reform measures in the future, but whether they can be passed remains a question.
PASOK has stated that it will not support further austerity policies that may be required by international creditors to bridge the funding gap.
The Greek state-owned natural gas company DEPA did not receive any bids before the tender deadline on the 10th of this month, leaving the Greek government with a gap of about 1 billion euros from the fundraising target required by international creditors. The Greek privatization process has lowered its phased fundraising targets several times, but progress still lags behind the schedule.
A member of the expert committee of the Hellenic Republic Asset Development Fund (HRADF) recently revealed that in order to achieve the established privatization fundraising goals, the government may advance the privatization process of some projects, such as the Port of Piraeus and the railway company, to be finalized within this year.
In the eyes of some industry insiders, COSCO will be the most powerful competitor for the privatization of the Port of Piraeus.
COSCO obtained the 35-year franchise for Piers II and III of the Port of Piraeus in Athens in 2008, while Pier I continues to be operated by the state-owned Piraeus Port Authority. At the beginning of this year, there were rumors that COSCO would make another move at the port. At that time, this newspaper verified through multiple sources that there had actually been no substantive progress in the relevant privatization project.
Sources close to the Greek government revealed that COSCO is currently negotiating with the Greek government on some plans involving the future development of the Port of Piraeus, but it is unclear whether it is related to Pier I.
After verification, the relevant assets and rights of the Port of Piraeus have not yet been included in the HRADF privatization project list. Even if it is officially included in the privatization list, on average, it takes 9 to 15 months for HRADF to complete the privatization process of a project.
Yiannis Boutaris, the mayor of Thessaloniki, Greece's second-largest city, also recently told this newspaper that there are Chinese companies interested in the Thessaloniki Port privatization project. He explicitly denied that it was COSCO, but did not respond to whether it was Hutchison Whampoa or other Chinese-funded enterprises. He said that the project will close for bidding at the end of this summer.
Hutchison Whampoa led a consortium to win the bid for the new container terminal project at the Port of Thessaloniki in 2008, but against the backdrop of the financial tsunami, it decided to abandon the acquisition a few months later, losing a huge amount in liquidated damages. Hutchison Port Holdings is one of the world's largest port investors, developers, and operators, with a port network spanning 51 ports in 25 countries.
It is not yet clear how Hutchison Whampoa is reconsidering the project. Tan Guozhi, head of media affairs for Hutchison Port Holdings, replied to this newspaper on the 21st that he would not comment on future port development plans.
The Port of Piraeus and the Port of Thessaloniki are located at the northern and southern ends of Greece, respectively, and both occupy strategic positions in the Mediterranean. If the terminal businesses of the two ports are operated by different companies in the future, competition will be inevitable.
Chinese-funded enterprises interested in Greek ports also face potential strong competitors. Vladimir Yakunin, president of Russian Railways, recently revealed that Russian Railways is discussing participating in the privatization of Greek state-owned assets through joint ventures with Western European companies. Previously, he had expressed strong interest in the privatization of Greek railways and ports.
Yiannis Boutaris told this newspaper that the Greek economy has indeed shown initial signs of a possible recovery next year, but there is still a long and bumpy road ahead to achieve a full economic recovery.
However, he still believes that the current Greece is one of the better places for foreign companies to invest because there are too many good investment opportunities and it has great growth potential.