Yorgos Michailidis for Evrensel
(Foto: Vasilis Rebapis/eurokinissi)
This year’s wildfires in Greece have burned an area that exceeds one million acres. This is not a unique phenomenon in the history of our country; however it is one of the greatest disasters caused by forest fires. What’s worth commenting on is the reaction of the government and the state apparatus. Point first. The fires started right at the time of the highest danger due to the very high temperatures. Hence, the state mechanism had to be fully prepared. Second, the fires began to burn on windless days. Therefore, the initial intervention should have been easy and the fire brigades were given time to reduce the fires.
Contrary to expectations, the citizens of Attica, Evia and the Peloponnese talk about the complete absence of firefighting forces and a firefighting plan. Indeed, after two or three days the fires were out of control, they had spread over an area of many kilometers and burned villages and crops.
Admittedly, the government has implemented a single plan. Evacuation of villages and settlements so that there are no human victims. Their anxiety so that the tragedy of 2018, when more than a hundred people were burned alive in Mati, Attica, is not repeated dominated everything. In 2018, the New Democracy party was in opposition and accused the SYRIZA government of incompetence and enormous responsibilities, demanding resignations. And indeed, the responsibilities of SYRIZA were great both in the prevention and the management of the situation. Since then, the doctrine of New Democracy in every forest fire has been the avoidance of any deaths. But that’s all. The management of the situation by the government and the state apparatus began and ended there. ‘’There are no human victims’’, they kept repeating while the whole of northern Evia was on fire and even in Attica, a few kilometers from the center of the capital, houses were burning. But then something else happened. An unprecedented burst of anger of residents in these areas began. They started blaming at the government and swearing live on TV at the Prime Minister for the almost complete absence of firefighters, planes, helicopters and vehicles. A hashtag literally translated Mitsotakis f..k off, based on the words of an angry resident of Evia on TV has dominated all social media for more than a week. So where was the fire department and the state apparatus? … The understaffed fire brigade, where the average age of firefighters is over 45 years, but also the understaffed forestry offices were obviously not enough to cover the entire extent of the fires. This immediately posed the question: Why did our government spend all this money on warplanes and battleships? Why did they kept hiring new police officers, forming new police units? One of the main things that caused people’s anger was when they saw policemen instead of firemen arriving at their villages. “Why do they keep sending us policemen and the army? They are of no use!”, local residents started complaining on camera. Tough questions to answer. The government then remembered the global climate crisis. Its ministers began to talk about the unprecedented heat wave, unprecedented winds, unprecedented weather conditions. The climate crisis, of course, exists. But nothing was unprecedented to justify the disaster.
In a third phase, strange accounts on social media and later even the top court in the country began to support the scenario of arson and some mysterious criminal organization that everyone started looking for but no one could describe who it consists of, how it is coordinated and what are its purposes. The scenario of the “agents of Turkey”, a common scenario that accompanied the wildfires, especially in the Greek islands, was not used this time. People learned in the news that Turkey was burning at the same time, as well as Albania and Northern Macedonia. So what was the criminal organization that aimed to burn the whole planet? The country’s highest court is reportedly still investigating. However, we ‘re sure that it won’t track down the economic system that brings profit before nature.
Unfortunately for the government none of these scenarios caught on and so the prime minister was forced for the first time in his term to apologize. To be precise, he kinda-apologozed for “any mistakes” while the executives of the state mechanism in their reports did not make any self-criticism, considering that “what was humanly possible” was done. The last phase of government fire management included many promises to finance the victims, fight bureaucracy, turn the disaster into a new chance for development and even use private organizations to regenerate forests under the bright idea of ‘’forest adoption’’ by private companies.
Opposition parties, for their part, have chosen not to put pressure on the government. The president of SYRIZA, Alexis Tsipras, spoke about the responsibilities of the prime minister, but did not ask for resignations while emphasizing the need for a “national plan” with the participation of all parties. The prime minister later said that the new planning undertaken by his government also includes the opposition parties. It is obvious that those who have ruled Greece in recent decades share the responsibility for the current situation of the fire brigade and forestry departments.
But in Athens, a demonstration of 3,000 people was organized by organizations of the communist and anti-capitalist Left, on August 9, something that has been happening for many years as the city is currently half empty with half of Athenians on vacation. At the same time, during the fires, dozens of solidarity movements sprang up all over Greece.
Political organizations, municipal movements, unions, grassroots collectives and even football fan clubs collected food and basic necessities, hosted fire victims and sent volunteers to the burning forests. This is one of the biggest waves of solidarity in recent years from people to people. Perhaps while recalling the burned forests and villages this is the most promising image we have to keep in our minds. Together with the common fate of all neighboring peoples under this cruel, catastrophic system.
