Skertsos:Investment grade is the national post-election goal

"Our goal is comparison and not conflict, conducting a civilized pre-election debate without toxicity but with a focus on the results of our policies that have made the lives of citizens better in recent years, but also on those areas of policy still lagging and the steps that need to be taken," Minister of State and government spokesperson Akis Skertsos said during a press briefing on Monday

“Our goal is comparison and not conflict, conducting a civilized pre-election debate without toxicity but with a focus on the results of our policies that have made the lives of citizens better in recent years, but also on those areas of policy still lagging and the steps that need to be taken,” Minister of State and government spokesperson Akis Skertsos said during a press briefing on Monday. He also noted the S&P upgrade of the Greek economy’s outlook and said that achieving investment grade remains a national goal for the government, since the first day of its election.

“The insistence on supporting facts is not a technocratic obsession, on the contrary, it is an example of the upgrading of political dialogue. Because what is not measured cannot be evaluated on its true basis. This is at the core of what we call politics with tangible results but also substantive political dialogue,” he added.

Regarding the operation to evacuate Greeks from Sudan, he said that by order of the Prime Minister, two air force planes were sent to Egypt on Sunday, together with special forces’ officers, in order to participate in the operation to extract Greek citizens. “The Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in cooperation with France and Italy, announced that 12 Greeks and their family members were safely evacuated, including the two injured expatriates from Greece. In addition, a group of 11 citizens of Greek origin and Greek interest arrived in Djibouti late at midnight. The prime minister is being constantly updated about the developments. The situation in Sudan will be raised today as the priority issue in the Foreign Affairs Council with our own intervention,” he noted, stressing that the effort to safely extract all Greeks from Sudan is continuing.

He also pointed out that, based on the data announced by Eurostat on Friday regarding 2022 – a very difficult year – Greece not only managed to avoid a fiscal deficit but actually recorded a small primary surplus of 0.1%, despite the fact that social support measures were among the most generous in Europe. “This performance is a result of have twice the European average for economic growth, which brought additional revenue to public funds, achieving the largest fiscal improvement in Europe after the pandemic,” he said. “The good results that we all achieved together, businesses, households, state and government, led S&P to upgrade the outlook of the Greek economy, which is just one step away from investment grade, to positive. This is also the national post-election goal for which we have been working since the first day of our election, and it means cheaper borrowing,” Skertsos underlined.