Lefteris Avgenakis was officially removed from the New Democracy Parliamentary Group for the incident of violence at El. Venizelos against an airline employee.

The Prime Minister referred the former minister to the Ethics Committee with a request to remove him for the violent incident. “Blue” executives emphasized earlier that the fastest possible procedure was followed, as a member of parliament could not be removed without first providing an explanation on his behalf and first Mr. Avgenakis had to return from Heraklion. Earlier, Lefteris Avgenakis was summoned and gave explanations both to the Speaker of the Parliament, Kostas Tassoulas, and to the Secretary of the ND’s Committee of the Regions, Stavros Kalafatis.

“I’m not giving up the seat”

However, Lefteris Avgenakis refuses to hand over his seat, although – as he says – he respects the decision to delete him.

As he typically states in his post, “I will continue to serve the citizens of Crete with the same passion.”

Prosecutor’s investigation

Meanwhile, a preliminary investigation into the incident at “Eleftherios Venizelos” airport was ordered by the head of the Athens Prosecutor’s Office, Antonis Eleftherianos.

The preliminary investigation was ordered after the complaints of representatives of the workers at the airport and the submission of a report by a PASOK-KINAL MP.

According to the prosecutor’s order, the crimes to be investigated are violence against an employee, disruption of the operation of a public benefit enterprise, illegal violence and damage to a thing that serves the public good.

It is noted that the further legal proceedings will require the lifting of his parliamentary immunity.

What came before

It all started after a complaint by the Federation of Airport Services Workers’ Unions about an incident of violence against an airline employee by the former minister. According to the complaint, Mr. Avgenakis “was traveling from Athens to one of the prefectures of Crete. After a delay of several hours, he found himself in front of the airport workers and started shouting, according to the content of the complaint. At some point, as they transfer us, the situation seems to have gotten out of hand, with the former minister hitting a member of staff on the head with the tip of his mobile phone who fell unconscious at the ticket control counter, with the rest of the staff resorting to the assistance of the police.”

Responding to the Federation’s complaint, Mr. Augenakis admits that there was an “incident”, apologized, but also stated that he was “surprised by the exaggerations and inaccuracies (…) about an incident of “severe beatings”, “fainting”, “manual beatings” On my part”.