The taxation of excess profits by refineries that the government has announced, is a "token taxation", SYRIZA-Progressive Alliance leader Alexis Tsipras charged on Wednesday.
Speaking at the presentation of the book "Backed against the wall: Negotiations for the economy and society, 2015-2019" (in Greek), Tsipras said that although refineries were expected to have 3 billion euros in excess profits by the end of 2022, their taxation by the government "will be based on the lowest denominator the European Union proposes, and will be registered as an expenditure, not tax."
The government runs a "clientelistic state, direct assignments of projects, uncontrolled and unregulated operation of the market, tax exemptions for the strong, across-the-board tax looting for many (…) and subsidies." All this has not led to the Mitsotakis government's key economic goal of reaching investment-grade level, the main opposition leader said.