“The government took the responsibility, but not the responsibility. If he continues like this, the Unknown Soldier himself will be to blame in the end”: this is what his sources say Municipality of Athenscontinuing the confrontation with the government and trying to explain why the mayor, Harry Doukasannounced an appeal to the Court.
“Recourse to Justice is not an act of confrontation, according to the same sources, but of institutional responsibility. When a government legislates with “creative ambiguity,” they point out, and then changes interpretations at will, the response must be legal and institutional.
“The Municipality will defend to the end what is self-evident: the right of the municipalities to exercise the powers recognized by the Constitution” they declare from the mayor’s office.
The same sources speak of a “theatre of the absurd” that has been set up in recent days around the Monument of Unknown Soldierarguing that it is the government that is undoing itself – and not the mayor of Athens -, as “the same executives who voted for the amendment – whereby the Ministry of Defense takes over the “care” of the area – began to claim that… nothing has changed and that the Municipality must continue to clean up”.
They point out, in fact, that the Mitsotakis government “is the first in history to legally remove competence from the Municipality of Athens, in flagrant violation of Article 102 of the Constitution, which states that “the administration of local affairs belongs to the Local Government Organizations”.
“Cleanliness, in fact, is the first responsibility that was transferred to the municipalities as early as 1833 – and it has never, until today, been removed” they observe.
They accuse the government of falsely claiming that the area is not being cleaned, and note: What the Municipality clarified from the beginning is simple and stable. We are cleaning the square. We do not erase the names of the victims. Nothing more, nothing less.”
earlier today, government officials, commenting on going to court from the Municipality of Athens, they said: “Within a few hours, Mr. Doukas canceled himself. Yesterday, after the meeting he had with the Minister of National Defense Nikos Dendias, the Mayor of Athens stated that, based on the amendment passed in the Parliament, the responsibility of taking care of the Monument of the Unknown Soldier and the surrounding area belongs exclusively to the government. In fact, he ironically expressed the wish for “good luck”, which, as the government representative Pavlos Marinakis pointed out, he should address to the citizens of the capital and to those who move around the city from the day of his election onwards”.
According to the same executives, “today Mr. Doukas announced that he will appeal to the courts on the issue of competence, saying the exact opposite of what he said yesterday.”
“Within record time, Mr. Doukas supported one position and its opposite. What remains is for him to untangle his thoughts, which may be important to him, but it does not concern society” they said, concluding: “In any case and given the reluctance of the Mayor, as announced today by the Ministry of National Defense, he is not going to allow the degradation of the Monument in any way, doing whatever is required for this”.