In the middle of the summer, the political developments in Greece are running. And if the great electoral victory of Kyriakos Mitsotakis was not a surprise for anyone – including Germany – the resignation of Alexis Tsipras from the leadership of SYRIZA was perhaps not as expected, causing extensive comments and analyzes in the German press.

We met in his office in the German parliament Gregor Guzi, a historical figure of the German Left and one of the longest-serving German parliamentarians. Born in 1948, he has a long political career that starts as early as the DDR era, continues in Reunified Germany and reaches today with the Left party. Having close contacts with other left-wing parties in Europe as well as a good knowledge of Greek issues, his assessment of the political footprint of Alexis Tsipras as former prime minister and head of SYRIZA has its own weight.

“When you try to represent in the EU an important but relatively small country, with economic and financial problems, you face greater difficulties. Alexis Tsipras worked hard, he tried hard, but other governments, including the German one, always ignored him with a bit of arrogance, and I think that hurt him. Despite this, he managed to be re-elected a second time. Since then he just hasn’t made it again. It also has something to do with the Greek electoral law, but I think he shouldn’t despair. He has already achieved enough, but he was the last left-wing prime minister in Europe,” Gregor Guzi tells DW.

“He promised a lot that he didn’t keep”

The German politician tries to explain the reasons for the fall of Tsipras: “As prime minister he had big plans and other governments did not make it easy for him. Then he followed the path that other governments indicated to him and as a result people became dissatisfied with him. The problem is that he promised too much that he couldn’t deliver. On the other hand, the governments of other countries forced him to move in the wrong direction. But he did not have the courage to say that he was being forced, but tried to defend the change of course, to explain it. I do not understand it. I like him and that will never change, but I think that was the big problem.”

In fact, he also reveals some aspects of the difficult first SYRIZA administration in 2015. “We always talked with Alexis Tsipras. I had also spoken to Chancellor Merkel about this. I found the demands of the former Finance Minister Schäuble wrong and therefore I had tried to help a little. We had also met when he first came to Germany officially as prime minister. It was interesting, both the visit and the impression Mrs. Merkel had of Alexis Tsipras. Tsipras had not made a bad impression on her at all,” recalls Gregor Gizi. Attempting an assessment with now historical distance, he notes: “People in Greece hoped that Tsipras would succeed (…) But you can’t do magic, you always have to fight in the election campaign but also say that you don’t know how many of them that you promise can actually be achieved.”

As for the steep drop in SYRIZA’s percentages from the 2015 elections until the recent election contest and also for the shift towards social democracy, the German politician observes: “Obviously with this shift they did not win. You always have to try to stay true to your positions and that was difficult for SYRIZA. Nevertheless they received 17%. Despite the significant drop in percentages, SYRIZA remains a strong left-wing party in Europe. As for other European left parties – even successful ones in the past – they have percentages, which you better forget! Therefore, SYRIZA remains important for the European left.” For Gregor Gizi, although Greece has made progress in recent years, there are some open issues, such as the issue of the rule of law (he is a lawyer), the slow delivery of justice and also the issue of freedom of the press. “Freedom of the press is always a difficult field, because as a power you have to tolerate and accept media that you don’t like. It’s not easy,” he says.

The rise of the extreme right and the responsibility of the left

Regarding the entry into the Greek parliament of the Spartans, Niki and Hellenic Solution, parties with an extreme right-wing and ethno-populist character, Gregor Gizi comments that this is a wider European – and German – phenomenon of the times. “We are seeing a trend towards nationalism and authoritarian governance structures and this has to do with people’s fear of globalization, because they don’t know what it brings with it,” he observes. “Coming from the former East Germany, I never thought it would fall. But this is also how the fall of democracy can come. We have to do something about democracy and freedom because nationalist, right-wing parties are succeeding everywhere, including in France.”

As in Germany, if you look at the percentages of the populist Alternative for Germany, which reach up to 21% at the federal level, making it the second party after the Christian Union. But why can’t the German Left get this 21% ; And why do the working class today tend to be more convinced by the far right than the left?

“Nationalist parties claim that they can solve everything at the national level,” Gizi notes. “The left has always belonged to the field of internationalism, not nationalism. However, many problems, ecological sustainability, peace and social issues cannot be solved at the national level.

Does the Left want to govern?

From then on, for him the low percentages of the Left have to do with a series of historical and political factors, starting with the collapse of existing socialism and the DDR in the case of Germany. In his view, this is the historical event that has been strongly inscribed in recent collective memory. “The Left must try to win the trust of the people and when it comes to power, it should not promise things it cannot deliver,” says Gregor Guzi. Although because of the war in Ukraine participation in a governmental structure would be de facto non-negotiable from the Left, he nevertheless admits “that there are certain cadres of the Left who always rule out a governmental role in advance.”

For him, however, once a party participates in the democratic processes, it should also be ready for the role of the opposition, which for Gizi consists of “changing the spirit of the times. In giving alternatives, how social peace can be achieved, more social and fiscal justice, more equality, socially responsible green sustainability.” In fact, he himself remembers that already in the early 90s he had proposed a universal, mandatory minimum wage. “Decades later, it was implemented by the Christian Democrats, the Bavarian Christian Socialists and the Social Democrats.”