Voters should see the whole picture when they go to cast their ballot in the European Parliament elections on June 9, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said in an interview on Thursday.
Speaking to Skai TV and journalist Sia Kosioni on the main evening newscast, Mitsotakis addressed the voters planning to vote for far-right parties and called them to see the whole picture, and not resort to cheap messages. Voters, he underlined, should "very carefully consider whether we want parties in parliament that advocate for brutal violence and intolerant racist discourse with division and hatred."
Commenting on Wednesday's incident where Independent MP Konstantinos Floros, formerly of Spartiates party, was charged with physically attacking fellow MP of Elliniki Lysi Vassilis Grammenos in parliament, the PM described it as "hair-raising and revealing: the temple of democracy cannot turn into a boxing arena." The incident, he added, revealed what is taking place in the far-right faction, describing it as a conglomeration of parties built on lies and violence. Referring also to Elliniki Lysi party, he said that "whoever saw what happened in parliament may reach their own conclusions about the degree to which these parties represent Christianity and patriotism. There are a lot of so-called patriots out there." New Democracy (ND) stood up before far-right Spartiates from the very start with specific actions, Mitsotakis said, adding that he feels vindicated "by the fact that this specific formation is banned from Europarliamentary elections."
Speaking of his own party, he said ND's ballot lists were diverse, and added that he wanted to reach the same percentage the party garnered in the last Europarliamentary elections (it rose to 33.12% and gained 8 seats in the European Parliament). "What I want is to elect as many Eurodeputies as possible," the Greek PM said, adding, "We want the best result; but if it is not good, our lives will be harder but the government will not fall, nor will we have (national) elections."
Speaking of the economy, Mitsotakis acknowledged high prices as a huge issue, and knew how squeezed households were. He said there is no magic formula, but underlined that "the better the economy does, the more salaries will rise. There are indications that inflation is receding. Competition is one of the answers, and it worked in electricity bills - prices in energy are lower because competition worked out, and because we supported households. We also had European Union support."