On Monday, without fanfare or any other ceremony or pause for thought that would indicate otherwise, it was another ordinary day in Greece. But for those who count its pennies, take stock of its bonds, trade in its securities, or make sure it pays its dues, Monday was highly significant.
For the first time in eight long years, the treasury of Greece is once again independent, free of outside oversight, free to look after its own finances. Athens has emerged from a series of three successive bailouts provided by the international “troika” of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the European Central Bank (ECB) and the European Union (EU).
Over these past eight years, the troika provided three lifelines to Greece, a nation where for every €1 (Dh4.23) in circulation in its economy, another €1.83 is owed to foreign lenders. That high level of debt precipitated the crisis where it could no longer pay the interest on its bonds. The three bailouts totalling some €289 billion saved Greece, kept it in the 19 members of the Eurozone, and ensured its future membership of the EU itself.
The price for those bailouts were slashed social programmes, cuts to pensions, higher taxes, the sale of Greek assets to the private sector and a wave of austerity — necessary, the troika would say, to ensure that the Greeks live within their means. Unemployment there is at 14 per cent — but exceeding 40 per cent for those under 25.
The Greek experience should be a warning to the new Italian government, in particular, that runaway and unbridled spending cannot be sanctioned as long as a nation remains with the euro and under EU budgetary limits. Anything else is a recipe for this modern Greek tragedy.
