“My resignation statement is eminently political and, as I mention, when indecency is repeated, decency must respond,” Charis Kastanidis after his “divorce” with PASOK‘s Nikos Androulakis.

The former minister and historical party official, speaking to Real FM 97.8, claimed that “it is obvious that Mr Androulakis does not want my political presence. He says in every possible way “I am burdened by your political presence”. Obviously he wants to have a clear field for some decisions. We’ll see what they are, especially post-election”.

“Definitive break”

A statement of about 200 words followed in which he announced his exit from the party, accusing its chairman of being “insulting, untruthful and posturing”. With this statement, Charis Castanides confirmed those who claimed that the break with Androulakis was final.

“In my political career I have committed myself only in the name of ideas and principles for which I fought without compromise. Often at human and political cost. I learned from the surprise of circumstances, but I am unable to get used to the surprise of persons,” he says in it and explains, referring to the history of the contest. Afterwards, his colleagues, appointed in the Organizational Sector, took it upon themselves to threaten organizations that dared to invite me as a speaker. And to leave no doubt about his intentions, at the recent Congress, he invented an amendment to the PASOK statutes to exclude a single person from the Movement’s ballots. The maximum term limit that he instituted for deputies in the party’s constitution, with retroactive effect, does not concern anyone else, as some people falsely propagated, but only me. At the Delphi Forum, he said that he introduced the term limit because long-serving MPs are guilty of patronage and bribery. He forgot, of course, to say that he exempted from the regulation former PASOK presidents who can continue to be MPs even though they have completed 20 years in office. It seems that past presidents, like himself when he is a “past president” in the future, will be buried by their title and remain “untainted” by buffoonery and clientelism. Mr Androulakis’ claim is insulting, untruthful and self-serving.”

“Mr. Androulakis will not determine whether I will be in the political life of the country. That will be decided by the Greek people or by me,” he had clarified in early April regarding Androulakis’ decision calling it “imaginative perfidy.” At that time he had referred to the future to position himself further and the fullness of time came yesterday!

The relations between the two never have been smooth with Kastanidis accusing Androulakis of factionalism, while in the showdown with Charis Doukas he had openly supported the latter. “I usually avoid commenting on Mr Androulakis and the leadership team surrounding him. I will only say one sentence with which you will be able to unlock more meanings. It is one thing to lead a faction and it is another thing to lead a party,” he had said in an interview. In fact, he had in the past blamed him for the party’s failure and called on him to resign “if he has the ambition”.

“I’m not going to Tsipras”

In an interview with Real, he noted that “this is a moment of intense emotion. I made a statement that leads to the resignation from the Androulakis mechanism, there is nothing else behind it. There are no communications or contacts with parties and persons,” rejecting possible cooperation with Alexis Tsipras, while on the possibility of his return to PASOK if there is a new leader in the future, he said that “jumping through time does not help anything at this time. I wish PASOK, the party I have served and loved, would return to a different path“.

As for the course of PASOK, speaking this time on ERTnews Radio 105.8, he noted: “If we say that there are three factors that play a role in a party’s good electoral performance, they are: first, there is a very serious, well-informed and intelligent leadership, the leadership that can win the trust of the people. The second factor is the radicalization of the people and the third factor is a program that is owned by the Greek people with a few lines and they understand that it will lead to better days. Isn’t one of the factors and leadership playing a role? (…)”.

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