Mitsotakis from Patras: We are a government that invests in projects, not words

Most of 80 projects and interventions implemented, have been launched or planned as part of the integrated plan for Patras 2030 were presented in the morning, at the headquarters of the Region of Western Greece in the city, during an event attended and spoken by Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, a large government echelon and the Regional Governor of Western Greece Nektarios Pharmacist. The event was coordinated by the Minister of State Akis Skertsos.

“We are a government that invests in projects, and not in words” said the Prime Minister.

The network of actions, which concern the development of infrastructure, education, health, quality of life and other aspects of the economic and social life of the wider region, were presented and analyzed by the Minister of Education and Religion Niki Kerameos, the Minister of Health Thanos Pleuris, the Minister of Culture and Sports Lina Mendoni, the Minister of Shipping and Island Policy Yannis Plakiotakis, the Minister of Rural Development and Food Giorgos Georgantas, the Minister of Tourism Vasilis Kikilias, the Deputy Minister of Development and Investments Nikos Papathanasis, the Deputy Minister of Health Mina Gaga, the Deputy Minister of Interior Stelios Petsas, the Deputy Ministers of Development and Investments Yiannis Tsakiris and Christos Dimas, the Deputy Minister of Education Angelos Syrigos, the Deputy Minister of Infrastructure Giorgos Karagiannis, the Deputy Minister of Environment and Energy Nikos Tagaras, the Deputy Minister of Sports Lefteris Avgenakis, the Secretary General of Waste Management Coordination Mankosolis C single Secretary of Energy and Mineral Raw Materials Alexandra Sdoukou and the Managing Director of TAIPED Dimitris Politis.

Representatives of organizations from the wider region and MPs from Western Greece were present.

The entire statement of the Prime Minister:

“Mr. Regional Governor, ladies and gentlemen Ministers, Deputy Ministers, Secretaries General, friends,

Let me start by expressing my satisfaction that today we are here, in Patras, to present what I believe is a coherent, comprehensive, studied, costed plan for how we perceive the future of Patras, Achaia and Western Greece as a whole.

I would like to start by saying that today’s presentation and the presence here in Patras of ten Ministers, seven Deputy Ministers, four General Secretaries, two Governors of organizations, certifies how we perceive the functioning of the staff state in terms of the implementation of policies, especially policies that have a regional character.

I want to first of all congratulate Akis Schertsos for the very important coordinating role he assumed, so that all the Ministries, the Deputy Ministries, the state structures, can cooperate harmoniously on a horizontal level. And of course at a vertical level to have a high level of cooperation with the Local Government, especially with the Region.

Why does this matter? Because when we come to you, we must be sure that we are recipients of your own concerns, your own priorities. You know the local specifics better than we do and it would be a big mistake if such a scheme were planned centrally by us without extensive consultation with the local community. That is why we are always open to improvements, comments, highlights, which will make this plan even more coherent and above all even more essential in terms of the results it produces.

I want us to have this active cooperation with the Local Government, not only through the competent Deputy Minister, but also at all levels. We have this cooperation, at an excellent level, with the Region, I would like to have it with the Municipality of Patreon as well. I want to emphasize that the government and I personally have never seen the Self-Government through party blinders and I hope that the reverse is also true.

I stop my introduction at this point and take a cue from something the Regional Governor said in his own statement, about how we share the same concern for regional development, which we must in any case if it is fair.

Akis was right when he said that essentially the development of the country and our attention was primarily focused on Attica and Thessaloniki and the third largest city of the country – a capital which, as we were told, we were reminded, comes from far away, a city with productive history, a dynamic bourgeoisie – had essentially fallen into a developmental tailspin in recent decades. This is what we are coming to correct with the comprehensive plan that we are presenting today.

I do not want to repeat at length everything that the Ministers have said, to focus only on the very great importance that we obviously attach to closing pending issues that come to us from the past in relation to the basic infrastructures.

Roads: Patra – Pyrgos. I don’t think there is a project that highlights to a greater extent the pathologies of the past but also the comparison between the previous and the current government in terms of the way in which we perceive the production of public policy.

I want to repeat that this project was doomed not to be done when we got down to business in 2019. It took a huge effort from the Ministry of Infrastructure so that we could get it off the ground, secure European funding. And today we are now absolutely certain, as the project is running and running at a fast pace, that at the beginning of ’25, at the latest I estimate, that it will be handed over to the residents of the area.

And I think it is a very important intervention, not just of a developmental nature, if we also consider the “blood tax” that has been paid, mainly by young children, on this road.

And of course outstanding issues that come from the past – which other European countries have resolved for decades, possibly for centuries – concern our railway infrastructures.

It is unthinkable to discuss Patras as the country’s western entry and exit gate without a modern railway network, which will start or end – depending on how you look at it – at the port of Patras.

This is why the interventions that were announced yesterday to get the train to Rio at first and then to the port, with a significant undergrounding of 5.2 kilometers within the urban fabric of Patras, is of such special importance.

Of course, the plans developed by the Minister of Merchant Shipping and the Managing Director of TAIPED regarding how we perceive the modern use of our ports, the new port, the old port, are also important.

And of course let’s think a little about the entire management of the coastal zone, possibly Akis through a more unified logic that will give us another opportunity to see holistically the opening of the city to the sea. Something that is a big challenge, not only for Patras. It was a challenge for Athens and Thessaloniki, cities very much identified with their sea front. It is these interventions that I think have their own special and very important significance.

Water management projects. Yesterday we visited the dam known as Peirou – Parapeirou. The solution to the irrigation of Achaia was also a pending matter which comes from the past. The Deputy Minister is right when he says that in this project too we risked being asked back more than 100 million. Not only did we avoid this recovery, but at the same time we now have a project that has the potential to irrigate even more communities with purified water, not only the water that is currently sent to Patras to the city’s refineries – an important intervention, and of course very important and the intervention concerning the irrigation networks.

A big challenge for the next day of our government, as long as the Greek people entrust us with this responsibility again, is the horizontal management of water. Unfortunately the responsibilities regarding water are fragmented today, it is the biggest problem that we will face in the medium and long term in terms of climate change, especially the issues related to irrigation, 85% of our water is directed to irrigation.

But issues that have to do with infrastructure, with networks, with correct measurement, with the rational use of water, will definitely rise to our priority. There is no productive primary sector without water and without rational water management. Both must go together.

Regarding the developmental issues, the city, I am glad, Mr. District Governor, is showing change, it is showing resilience. It has a developmental goal. This is evidenced by the number of businesses that have been created in recent years, the new investments that are made, many of them are productive investments, because there is an industrial footprint and tradition in Patras.

But of course there are also many investments in the area of ​​innovation. And there I think there really are a lot of great opportunities, in the area of ​​the new economy. The interface with the university and with the research centers, which must be reorganized around the university, offers enormous opportunities.

And the University of Patras cannot simply be a “blood donor” of the local community. This will continue to be, Patras is a university campus, but it is a pole of innovation, extroversion. A university which had the courage itself to proceed with an internal rationalization. But of course a university that can open up to the rest of the world and offer very important opportunities not only to the students who choose it but also to foreign students, visitors, researchers who can come to Patras to have access to the knowledge society .

As for the rest of the service issues, Patras has been left behind as a tourist destination. We can do more for the city of Patras, because obviously the wider Region has a lot of potential.

We have done a great job, to try to make our tourism 12 months and you also have mountains that can still be developed, some of which are completely unspoiled. The intervention made in Kalavryta, with the upgrading of the ski lift, will greatly increase its capacity and will give much more life to the whole mountainous mass of Helmos.

The interventions that are made in the field of culture are very important. A city with a great cultural identity, which must be highlighted at all levels.

Consequently, what you see today, as I told you, is a coherent plan that metabolizes – I would say – anger and anguish into a creative perspective. And I have always said that our job is to be able to unlock the great creative forces that exist in Greek society and obviously there are many here in Western Greece, in Achaia and Patras. And I think that in continuation of this very good cooperation that we have, now the plan is to implement all that we have committed to.

I want you to know that at the government level – the Ministers are well aware of this, I know – there is a very tight mechanism for monitoring the progress of all the projects and initiatives that we have announced. It is not a one-time firework. I think you got this right. We are a government that invests in works and not in words.

It may be that the official opposition leader is formally an MP from Achaia and I am not, but I think we have practically demonstrated our interest in Achaia, which, as I told you, will have depth and timelessness.

So let me once again thank the entire government echelon that is here, personally the Regional Governor for the excellent cooperation we have. And I think that today we have every reason, despite the great difficulties, we never hid them and we do everything we can to face them on many different levels, but I think that today we have every reason to see the future of Western Greece and especially its capital , of Patras, with much more optimism”.

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