Intervention in Plenary session of the Parliament on the fan violence bill, Nikos Androulakis made a strong criticism of the government, although he declared that PASOK-Movement for Change would vote for it on principle.

As he pointed out, “on December 11, after the bloody incidents in Rentis, the political leadership of the Ministry of Citizen Protection at the time closed the stadiums, a decision that we, even then, had disapproved of as a communication firework. A decision without substance. And you even committed then that these will only be opened after it is checked that a number of measures have been implemented, including the cameras and the electronic ticket control system.”

Mr. Androulakis added that “just the day before yesterday, Mr. Vroutsis announced that the stadiums will reopen for fans on February 12, without cameras and without an identification system, which will be installed – according to the new schedule – at the beginning of March and April, respectively”.

Mr. Androulakis said that the discussion of this particular bill is another failure of the government to deal with fan violence. “You are recycling the measures that are already planned”, he noted and criticized the government for not having the political will to solve the problem. “The existing framework is strict. Answer why you don’t implement it,” stressed Mr. Androulakis.

Its president PASOK-KINAL attributed responsibility and asked for explanations why they did not stop the Croatian hooligans, resulting in the death of the AEK fan, Michalis Katsouris and in the incidents in Rentis, last December, which led to the death of the police officer Giorgos Lyggeridis. “You didn’t do anything. What was stopping you from stopping them? Was the legislative framework to blame? Or that after 4 years of government by the ND, Mr. Economou received scorched earth from the police, as his successor Mr. Chrysochoidis almost declared, stressing the need for a “restart?”

Nikos Androulakis raised the issue of the complaint of 23 fixed games in “Betting”, according to UEFA, calling on the government to take immediate measures.

“Another basic weakness of the bill is that it does not touch at all the issue of corruption in Greek sports and especially in the field of football. A corruption that is fueled by powerful financial and other interests, but the government prefers to be the traffic warden, rather than set the rules. A few days ago, UEFA forwarded to Parliament files with 23 suspicious games. The Board of Directors of the Super League addressed a request for an institutional meeting to the competent prosecutor, in relation to the manipulation of matches,” he said.

The president of PASOK-KINAL formulated the positions of his party, stressing: “To break the endless cycle of violence and stop grieving young people, we are in favor of drawing up an action plan, the product of broad cross-party consensus. A plan that will tackle the problem at its root, on and off the pitch. Based on the tripartite prevention-control-punishment. Therefore, a multidimensional approach is required, but also a real will”.