A tough response from Adonis Georgiades on Stefanos Kasselakis‘s accusations of wasting €2.3 million, with references to the EU rules and the Recovery Fund.
The confrontation between Adonis Georgiades and Stefanos Kasselakis has become high-toned, following complaints about spending €2.3 million related to the communication of EESY projects through the Recovery Fund. The Health Minister responded sharply to the allegations of “wasteful advertising“, claiming that these are statutory and mandatory publicity activities under European regulations. At the same time, he cited official decisions and procedures governing the financing of the projects, completely dismissing the accusations and raising the stakes.
Health Minister Adonis Georgiadis‘s response to Stefanos Kasselakis was harsh, who threatened him with a complaint to the European Public Prosecutor because – as he claimed – he spent €2.3 million to advertise himself.
The sharp response
In a post on social media, the health minister said about Stefanos Kasselakis that “this man who is ignorant of the elementary rules for the execution of projects carried out with EU money has not only advertised his ignorance but also found the solution…. the public prosecutor’s office.”
“In other words, Mr. Kasselakis is denouncing me for decisions which are an obligation of the country in the context of the implementation of flagship projects of the TAA and which were issued before I became Minister of Health! We are talking about a regular show of desperate people,” wrote Mr Georgiades, calling on Mr Kasselakis to stop defaming the great projects that are being carried out for the benefit of the Greek people.
A detailed post by Adonis Georgiades:
“Mr @skasselakis threatened me today with a complaint to the European Public Prosecutor’s Office because he says “I am wasting €2,300,000 to advertise myself…! This man, who is ignorant of the basic rules of execution of projects carried out with EU money, not only advertised his ignorance but also found the solution….the prosecutor’s office. And well he is completely ignorant, but not a single person in his party was found to inform him about the European rules? So let him learn that all projects that are carried out with European funds necessarily include publicity costs. In other words, the EU obliges you to advertise the projects and make it appear that they were done with its own money. The costs have a minimum percentage of money on the total project and we put the smallest possible percentage:
1) On July 13, 2021, the executive decision of the Council of the European Union was adopted by which the assessment of the Recovery and Resilience Plan for Greece was approved.
2) On November 5, 2021, the Decision of the Governor of EYSTA was issued on “Approval of the Communication and Publicity Strategy for the Projects and Actions of the Recovery and Resilience Fund in the framework of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan “Greece 2.0”.
It explicitly states in paragraph 19 “The fact that the Communication Strategy is part of the approved Recovery and Resilience Plan for Greece and in accordance with the decision of the Deputy Minister of Finance on the determination of the Management and Control System for the Actions and Projects of the Recovery and Resilience Fund, the stakeholders involved in the implementation, monitoring, execution and operation of Actions and Projects are required to implement and comply with the Communication Strategy and the Guide for the Communication of the Communication Strategy and the Communication Strategy for the Implementation of the Recovery and Resilience Fund.These obligations concern the beneficiaries of EU funding, in particular:
the Implementing Bodies of Actions and Projects and the Ministries of Responsibility,
the Implementing Bodies of Financial Instruments,
three entities to which the implementation of actions and projects or part of them is entrusted and the final recipients i.e. natural or legal persons making use of the Recovery and Resilience Fund funds are responsible for at least the following actions for flagship projects and/or projects with a total cost of more than 10.000.000 €: implement a major communication action (e.g. event or campaign), in coordination with the EIF and, where appropriate, with the European Commission.
4) the project “Upgrading and Modernization of the Infrastructure of the NHS Hospitals” is funded by the EU with 254.000.000€.
5) on 18-12-2023 the inclusion decision for the project “communication and promotion of the actions of the Ministry of Health for the upgrading of the NHS” was issued with a total budget of 2.3 million €, i.e. less than 1% of the total budget of the project.
6) the tender process was flawlessly implemented by the Hellenic Ministry of Health, under the programmatic agreement between the Ministry of Health and the Hellenic Ministry of Health from 12/2023.
In other words, Mr. Kasselakis is denouncing me for decisions which are an obligation of the country in the context of the implementation of flagship projects of the Hellenic Ministry of Health and which were issued before I became Minister of Health! We are talking about a regular show of desperate people.
I urge him to stop discrediting the great projects that are being done for the benefit of the Greek people.
My: But do they really want to beat @kmitsotakis when they don’t even know the absolute basics? And he put the European Public Prosecutor’s Office in it for what? To scare me? Come on Jesus Christ!”
