One of the important reasons for the defeat was that in the elections SYRIZA had a blurred identity, stressed the presidential candidate of SYRIZA-PS Euclid Tsakalotos in an event he participated in on Tuesday, in Rethymnon, entitled “Health: Neoliberalism – Left”.

Mr. Tsakalotos noted that in the face of the challenges it faces, SYRIZA must have a coherent political plan with a horizon of 2026, “for its identity, its social references and its renewed programmatic discourse”. “The Left must address everyone, but with a specific identity.

It should be clear to whom SYRIZA is addressing, but also who it is when it is addressed. Because one of the important reasons for the defeat was that in the 2023 elections, SYRIZA had a blurred identity,” he said characteristically, adding that “without a plan we cannot move forward.” “Ant’s work is needed and working groups are needed,” he noted, speaking of a party “that speaks politically and ideologically and does not only operate administratively, because only in this way can the world become a communicator of its ideas.” He emphasized the importance of the ideological struggle that must be fought, “since the Center-Right has succeeded in making its positions hegemonic”, and pointed out that “that is why the Left must contrast its positions and say, for example, that security does not depend on the existence of immigrants but on socio-economic inequalities and social exclusion’. He added that the Left must raise issues that are not yet hegemonic in society and create developments, “as it did for example with the cohabitation pact, which when it was legislated was not hegemonic but now it is”. “To have a radical realism, expanding the limits of the possible,” he commented. Mr. Tsakalotos referred to all three points of his campaign, which he has focused on and considers important, credibility, unity and the Left.

“We have to build a solid party”

Also speaking about the party in an interview on New Crete Television, Mr. Tsakalotos stated that “we must build a solid party, a party that knows its identity, knows where it is directed, knows its values, collectivity, cooperation, a a party that knows how to turn values ​​into practical policies”. “We didn’t have the party that was so robust, that had the self-confidence and pride in its analyses, in its ideas, in its values ​​and of course in its program,” he said.

“Strong public health is a priority for the new developmental state”

“We cannot leave public health in the hands of the ND, which is gradually discrediting it, not addressing the understaffing and underfunding of the National Health Service,” the SYRIZA presidential candidate emphasized.

In the debate – which was moderated by the former Minister of Health and member of the PG of the party Andreas Xanthos, while Yannis Kalomenidis, professor of Pulmonology EKPA from “Evangelism” and Katerina Manimanaki, orthopedist, from the Chania hospital – also spoke, Mr. Tsakalotos said that “the attack of the neoliberals on public goods is not done directly, but through the method of “salamiization”.

Mr. Tsakalotos expressed the position that strong public health is a priority for a new developmental state. He spoke of the new possibilities created in a society where productivity is constantly increasing and therefore has more resources at its disposal. He underlined that “as a society we have to decide if some things in life will not be defined by the rules of the market but will be the subject of a political decision. And the level of public spending on health and convergence with the EU average (7.5% of GDP) is something that should be the subject of a political decision.”

During the event, the speakers as well as the attendees discussed issues concerning, among other things, the problems of the public health system, the policies implemented during the SYRIZA government “and which stopped its course of decline, but also the policies of the ND that accelerate the disorganization of public structures and create favorable ground for their privatization”.