The Greek government on Wednesday hastily suspended a subsidy program linked with online continuous education and retraining for self-employed professionals, such as engineers and even physicians, announcing that a 600-euro bonus will be allocated directly to eligible beneficiaries.
The program, announced amid the coronavirus pandemic, was essentially an indirect attempt to hand out a bonus to now jobless or under-employed self-employed professionals. The plan was sharply criticized by opposition parties, professional chambers and even by ruling New Democracy (ND) party deputies and cadres as utilizing private vocational schools, many of questionable quality, as the intermediaries and "facade" for allocating the welfare benefit.
Money for the program was not derived from state coffers, but rather from the National Strategic Reference Framework (NSRF).
Conservative government sources on Wednesday credited an order by PM Kyriakos Mitsotakis to "axe" the program, ostensibly in a bid to shift responsibly for the hastily implemented plan unveiled by the relevant labor and social insurances ministry.
Additionally, another directive, also attributed to Mitsotakis, said a wholesale evaluation of such vocational schools and adult continuing education institutes will commence.
A firestorm of criticism and derision erupted on Greek-language social media over the past week after a handful of such institutes posted instructional material on their website apparently translated, from English into Greek, using online translation platforms, such as Google Translate.
The results were often comical.
