Fallout continued on Thursday from the previous day's acrimonious debate in Parliament prior to a vote to establish a committee of inquiry related to a controversial indictment that itself is the product of a judicial probe into Novartis' Greek subsidiary, given that 10 former prime ministers and ministers have been implicated by three anonymous "protected witnesses".
All 10 of the implicated individuals, including a caretaker former prime minister who served for less than 40 days (Panayiotis Pikrammenos), will be investigated by the newly established committee, as deputies representing the dominant ruling party - radical left Syriza - and its junior coalition partner - the rightwing populist Independent Greeks' party (AN.EL) - were more than enough to approve a Parliamentary probe on each one of the 10.
The latter include such political "heavyweights" as former premier Antonis Samaras, current Bank of Greece (BoG) Gov. Yannis Stournaras, current EU Commissioner Dimitris Avrampoulos and former PASOK president and finance minister Evangelos Venizelos. Most of the those implicated by the "protected witnesses", whose testimony began roughly three months ago and concluded on Sunday, Feb. 4, were former health ministers in previous governments.
According to reports, one and only Greek politician whose name was included in the FBI's ongoing probe was not mentioned in the corresponding Greek investigation, overseen by two separate anti-corruption prosecutors, the first of whom resigned.
"Yesterday's debate turned into a Waterloo for the government majority," was the first reaction on Thursday by main opposition New Democracy (ND) spokeswoman Maria Spyraki, who also warned the Tsipras government "not to conclude the preliminary (Parliamentary) committee (of inquiry) in haste, something Mr. (Alexis) Tsipras has already announced."
"The accusers became defendants, and an attempt at criminal prosecution against its opponents is nothing more than political persecution," she added.
In a reply, the poll-trailing coalition government's response came from its ubiquitous unnamed sources, which returned the "Waterloo" quip by saying it described ND's stance during the vote on a parliament investigation into the allegations against the 10 past and present lawmakers.
The reaction, albeit unofficial, by the government side refers to the fact that ND's deputies did not vote in the process, instead they remained in the chamber.
