By Vassilis Kostoulas
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Greece's exit to the markets is not a high priority, especially under the present circumstances, given that a "cash buffer" has been accumulated whereas the country's debt servicing over the next 10 years will come under particularly favorable conditions, Jeroen Dijsselbloem told "N" this week.
The former high-profile Eurogroup president, one of the European protagonists in the turbulent Greek debt crisis, nevertheless added that the Greek government is not conveying a positive message to the markets with its pressing request - so soon after exiting the third bailout - to suspend already pre-legislated pension cuts.
At the same time, he said Athens' main argument, namely, that the pending social security reduction is not a reform measure, is credible.
Conversely, he said a more ominous development is the poll-trailing Tsipras government's intent to increase the minimum monthly wage in the country, which he said will hurt the Greek economy's competitiveness.
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Moreover, Dijsselbloem continued to express an unfavorable view of one-time Greek finance minister Yanis Varoufakis, who led the Greek side's failed negotiations with creditors during the first half of 2015 and was his primary interlocutor during the period. The former Dutch finance minister said he believes Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras wanted to remove the mercurial Varoufakis from the crucial post earlier, but hesitated because the latter "had become extremely popular in a very short time."
In response to a question, he speculated on how developments in the country would have turned out had former center-right prime minister Antonis Samaras insisted on concluding the second memorandum bailout before snap elections brought Alexis Tsipras and his radical SYRIZA party to power in January 2015.
In an indirect message-cum-advise to current main opposition leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis, whose New Democracy (ND) leads ruling SYRIZA by double-digit percentage points in practically all mainstream opinion polls, Dijsselbloem emphasized that any new debt relief for Greece will only be achieved with primary budget surpluses of 3.5 percent of GDP until 2022 - and 2.2 percent in the years that follow.
Finally, he acknowledged that while much work has been done and progress made, the still very high rates of NPLs burdening Greek systemic banks' balance sheets must be reduced in order to attract new capital.
