In a particularly fierce statement, ELAS attacks Kyriakos Mitsotakis and Adonis Georgiadis over their barbs at Alexis Tsipras, prompted by his accusation that the current government is corrupt.
“Citizens don’t bark. They know and vote,” it says, among other things, as the Amalias Street office challenges Maximos Mansion to speak “with evidence and names” about “the IOUs he supposedly paid off” by the former prime minister.
“So shut up (…) Because the more you persist in slinging mud, the more firmly people will believe that, at the end of your term, you are trying to drag political debate and the country down into the spiral of your own immorality and decay,” reads one particularly striking passage in the sharply worded response.
The full statement:
“With society under siege from soaring prices, corruption and the threat of a freezing winter, the prime minister, who has questions to answer, resorts to the guilty person’s last refuge: slinging mud at those who expose his policies and their motives, and fight for a Greece built on justice and integrity.
It is only logical that his main target should be Alexis Tsipras, head of ELAS. His integrity is a thorn in the side of their corruption. For years they have been ‘digging into’ him and have failed to find even a hint of suspicion.
And they are right to see him as a threat to their days of plenty.
So the country’s own prime minister does not hesitate to sink into the mire of slander, manufacturing and spreading smears.
Not to prove that he is honest, because he knows that the overwhelming majority of society has irrevocably concluded that he heads the most corrupt government since the restoration of democracy. But to cast his opponent in his own corrupt image.
And the health minister, Maximos Mansion’s man in charge of mudslinging, has once again taken on the dirty work: unleashing vulgar abuse and barking on society to hide the results of his boss’s policies.
We will not give them the satisfaction. They will not drag us into their mire.
We will keep pressing the question they keep dodging: We said plainly that, with the changes to the Criminal Code, you, Mr Mitsotakis, paid off IOUs to the bankers.
It has been 24 hours since Alexis Tsipras threw down the gauntlet and challenged you to name names and provide evidence for the IOUs he supposedly “paid off”, as you dared to claim. Why are you silent?
Because you know full well that your slander cannot withstand serious debate. There is not a shred of truth in it.
And that is why you keep your mouths shut.
So shut up. For your own good, at least, since you do not care about stability or the country.
Because the more you persist in slinging mud, the more firmly people will believe that, at the end of your term, you are trying to drag political debate and the country down into the spiral of your own immorality and decay.
Neither we, nor the democratic forces, nor concerned citizens will allow it. We will overwhelm you with honesty.
We will confront you with unwavering opposition to rising prices, glaring social injustice, and the undermining of justice and the rule of law—all produced by your devotion to the privileges of the wealthy and to cartels, and your indifference to the great majority of society.
Greece is not, and we will not allow it to become, one vast Choriatiko, dough for Pizza Fan, or a source of enrichment for the Frappes. Nor, of course, the kennel you want it to be.
You will end up covered in your own mud.
Because citizens don’t bark. They know and vote…”