No one can be immune from law
We are very close to having to face a major paradox. Should the former managing director of Siemens Hellas Michalis Christoforakos, who was arrested in Munich on Thursday, be extradited to Greece in order to stand trial, any evidence he could possibly give about the politicians whose palms he greased to secure lucrative contracts for the German electronics company will have absolutely no standing in a court of law. The reason why Christoforakos’s testimony may end up being completely useless is that, here in Greece, members of Parliament enjoy immunity from prosecution, which means that any crimes committed in relation to the Siemens scandal can easily be erased. This state of affairs naturally enrages the public and it must change, because, in a democracy, you cannot have one set of laws for politicians and another for the country’s citizens. Let us hope that with the government’s initiative to have this law amended, we will see a real dialogue on this immunity clause, which so undermines the credibility of the political system.
