Beyond any kind of cockiness, wild rebel yells and generally dramatic histrionics by anyone towards the People, it is important to discuss why we need Popular Initiative, in the projection of substantive objections to all ‘programs’ of harsh austerity measures and of general social impoverishment, projected and side-supported by the necessary goebbelist terrorist propaganda of the mass media.
This initiative has nothing to do with heroism or utopian / idealist prompts to glory or whatever related to it. On the contrary, it has everything to do with a necessary legal move that as a People, we ought to proceed with, so that we will not relay the message (and thus pre-empt the analogous future for ourselves) that would not express our will at all.
Everyone that knows even a little law or has understood the way of legal thinking (not the scientific legal tricks, but what every lawyer tells the client), knows well that silence and complacence, instead of immediate reaction and active objection in the face of violation of possession and use of property rights, constitutes silent acceptance and approval of the trespassing, encroachment and embezzlement attempted onto those rights. Also, silence and retreat on changes and claims made unto the rights of someone, without active objection to and refusal of such claims, constitutes acceptance of the said changes and admittance of the necessity to respond in accordance to the said claims. (Even in the cases where the defendant exercises his/her legal right to remain silent, without his/her silence being construed as an admission of guilt, in practice and in effect, such a defendant worsens his/her position).
Therefore, we are facing a coordinated attack against the People that needs to be answered, because if such attacks are not answered in particular ways, even popular wrath (which however is general and diffused, taking also into consideration the fact of censorship on all opinion against the government, the IMF and EU, at least in the mass media but even within the parliamentary groups) will come to mean silent acceptance of the attack on the People by the People. This of course would mean crystallization and legalization of the economic and social hurricane that has already hit and is here to stay for much longer that the 10 years that are between the lines left to be understood as the real period of probation that G. Papandreou and the others have allowed to be imposed on Greece.
More particularly, we have disruption of ownership and control of our country and of its resources (the Constitution gives ownership and control in fact to the Ruling people), disruption of its sovereignty, clear accusation towards the People that they embezzled and usurped foreign funds (apart from the government, on which this foreign-led accusation is applied much less), and of course, the accusation of abetting the economic criminal acts of the government, at least those of the post-junta period.
There have already been analyses, not only mine, but by many other authors, on how the above described rights are disrupted and are under attack, citing numerous articles of the Constitution that are being encroached upon, treaties that are being ignored, illegalities that remain unpunished by Greek ‘justice’, the numerous very provocative (much more than Antoinette’s pearl necklace) spending, black money and fraud against the Greek People, and of the provocative immunity and exploitation of the role of the judge (in fact in the Biblical sense) enjoyed by those criminals – perpetrators of acts of lechery on the Greek People.
Our purpose here is to see how we must react so as to deter not only the accusation and the foreign-led attempt to disrupt the rights of ownership and control of our State and society, but also to acquire the capability to wave the onus of a made-up crisis under the control of speculators in the general sense (ranging from the well-known career politicians to bankers – including those of the Bank of Greece – the large-scale capitalists and generally the state-fed ‘businessmen’ of the subsidies, of the state contractors, monopoly and cartel controllers, privatized state business owners, religious leaders, MGOs, television channel owners, publishers, etc).
What should be done?
It is clear that a plebiscite would be totally wrong for G. Panadreou, the IMF and the EU that are taking hold of the country as we speak, and the prime-minister is not going to ask for one, unless it is unconditionally shown that if he does not proclaim one, he will officially become the dictator – and the usurper of power, much worse than Tsolakoglou, who was a collaborator to military occupiers that invaded the country but were not invited in by anybody).
Therefore we have to proceed with a move that could not be perverted by the mass media, be ‘cooked’ a la junta or fall victim to juridical ‘interpretations’ such as those of the Supreme Court in the cases that acts of politicians encroaching on the Constitution have to be protected.
This means that we need a text, a passage, that will demand the application of the Human Rights and of the central articles of the Constitution (many readers, bloggers but also regular commendators have many times made explicit reference to how many articles of the Constitution are being encroached upon by the practices of both PASOK and NDP) which will acquire the role of a pandemic, if possible, vote INCLUDING the demand for criminal persecution, both of the penal and civil laws (but at this moment and time, only of the civil law, so that we could claim our stolen money back) of everyone who, during the post-junta period (or at least for the period that we, the People are being accused of such facts by the EU or the IMF), have been incumbents of posts of General Secretaries, Managers, Bankers, CEOs and up in the State Apparatus, as well as the examination for the legal status and management of funds of state contractors of every company, NGOs, Charity/ Multinational, etc that has accepted state subsidies, state contracts, or other forms advisory role in the state.
If we only count the scandals by Vatopedion, Goldman Sachs. C41, Siemens, Olympic holdings and Olympic Games committees, we shall have a legal base wide enough to proceed with a vertical check of every such dealing and agreement that took place and cost us millions and billions in euros.
This declaration demanding a Referendum will have to be signed by as many Citizens as possible and be officially served to Parliament.
If such a demand is accepted for reasons of avoiding labelling Papandreou as devious coup d’ etat dictator, fine.
If it is not accepted, then we the People will have disclaimed any complicity or silent acceptance of the situation, and in fact we shall be a People who seeks legality and lawfulness denied to them by the corrupt political scenery of all those that still uphold such scenery in support of the government.
This means that the People would acquire the legal right not to accept orders by a coup d’ etat government as the government would become defunct.
Also, we shall be able to appear before International Tribunals and Human Rights Courts for double vindication (because on the one hand our Constitution would be under attack and on the other that vital human rights are being encroached upon). These vindications will open the way for mass remunerations for damages, restitution of stolen funds by the State Insurance Funds and generally for the much sought after catharsis, that all who support this sick clientelistic state besetting Greece, call through their goebbelist propaganda ‘utopian’ or ‘undoable’.
The organization needed is indeed very little, and demands as little as the announcement of the dates for a concert or of a athletic event, via the internet, mobiles, phones and in places that people gather.
Under no circumstances should unionists, party members, charities, NGOs of every color and stance be allowed to boycott the whole movement. This action should be taken only and exclusively by Greek Citizens enjoying full political rights.
A good start could be on May 1st but also via the announcement of dates where signatures in pre-designated places would be collected (i.e., Constitution Square, train stations and generally places where hundred of thousands of people pass by on a daily basis). Also on the internet (based on the same logic that scientists signed for the letter to Obama against allowing Skopje to be named Macedonia, and accepting the re-writing of history), there can be a specific site where Citizens can easily and from their own computer, sign up stating their ID number or any other means of identification (to avoid fixing of results). Signatures collected from other points will also be fed to this site so that no mess up can result.
In any case, beyond the fact that as Citizens, we will have dealt with the issue totally peacefully and democratically fully pursuant to the stipulations of the Constitution, we will have raised ourselves to a high standing, that so many readers from abroad wander why we have not done so already, we will have avoided acting in violence, which could be goebbelishly interpreted to suit their purposes, and we will have taken back even the false mandate that the present government claims to be its basis up to now.
We have everything to win with such action, while through our inaction and apathy we can only lose because it is clear that austerity will become even harsher, indigence even more acute and the licentious avarice of all those that enforce it, even wider.
Claims to recourse to the Constitution made even by those that blatantly encroach it (see Pangalos and other parliamentarians all the way to Karatzaferis), is the proof that such Constitution is still active and powerful, as is the Constitution of every country that acts on its principles.
Therefore, the only thing we have to do is to activate it as our peaceful weapon so that we will reclaim not only our honour, dignity and money, but also our Country.
It is not undoable, nor is it utopian. We have done it before, even in times that there was no Constitution.