The latest political mini-furor in Athens this week, on the margins of crucial developments regarding the second review of the Greek bailout and efforts for economic recovering, focused on a SYRIZA deputy who admitted that he received a "holiday bonus" last December that was abruptly doled out for all pensioners receiving below 800 euros in monthly benefits.
Speaking on a morning current affair program, Makis Balaouras, a former long-time unionist at the Bank of Greece, said that after his election to Parliament with leftist SYRZA his monthly pension benefits were cut by 70 percent, as per legal provisions.
Nevertheless, he subsequently learned that the pension reductions automatically bumped him into a "low-income pensioners" category.
He said he received 300 euros from the one-off benefit granted by the Tsipras government last December, regardless of assets and income criteria - a decision that generated heightened criticism by Greece's institutional creditors.
Balaouras said he later forwarded the money to a "strike fund" held by Bank of Greece employees' association and a solidarity fund for retired BoG employees.
