Siemens probe a disgrace
While authorities in every other country embroiled in a cash-for-contracts scandal involving the German electronics giant Siemens quickly dealt with the matter and the guilty parties were prosecuted and punished with hefty fines, here in Greece, both the government and the opposition are struggling with accusations that party members received bribes, while evidence pertaining to the case continues to trickle through at a snail’s pace. The resulting cloud of suspicion and the fact that the issue has still not been laid to rest are eroding the credibility of the political body as a whole and are thus harming the country as a whole. If the two main parties have any interest in freeing the country from the grips of this scandal, they should step up and hand over any evidence they may hold to the prosecuting authorities and help them shed light on every aspect of the affair. They also have a duty to get down to the task of creating all those independent mechanisms that are already in place in other countries to ensure transparency in the country’s financial and political sectors so that such disgraceful affairs are not repeated.
