The common message of officials during the annual regular congress of the Central Union of Greek Municipalities (KEDE) in Rhodes that opened on Thursday was “The time has come to restart local government.”
The congress was inaugurated on Thursday afternoon by Hellenic Republic President Katerina Sakellaropoulou at the Rodos Palace Hotel and will run through Sunday.
Metropolitan of Rhodes Kyrillos and representatives of parties attended, including Communist Party of Greece (KKE) General Secretary Dimitris Koutsoubas, SYRIZA Parliamentary Group President Nikos Pappas, Plefsi Eleftherias party leader Zoe Konstantopoulou, ministers, Dodecanese Islands deputies, government officials, mayors, and other officials of local government.
In a brief address, the Greek president referred to the challenges municipalities face, particularly in terms of climate change.
Following her speech, KEDE President Lazaros Kyrizoglou presented Sakellaropoulou with an honorary plaque, noting that it is the first time that a Greek president attends a KEDE congress.
The congress opened with the welcoming address of Alexandros Koliadis, the hosting mayor of Rhodes and president of the Regional Union of Municipalities, who focused on island towns and their special needs and called on attendees to reflect what Greece would look like without its islands.
Also hailing the meeting was South Aegean Regional Governor Giorgos Hatzimarkou, who referred to the role of local government and the support of the Region to its municipalities.
Local Gov’t Code
KEDE chief Kyrizoglou reviewed the issues at municipalities, their goals and requests, while he also noted their achievements in the last few years. He extolled the hard work of elected local government officials, who he said worked beyond party affiliations.
Speaking of the outstanding issues, he named large structural problems such as the overlap of responsibilities, unforeseen events that stretch municipalities to the limit, and government factors that prevent them from functioning as well as they can. He also added that despite having the highest funding resources for local government based on programs like the NSRF, the Recovery Fund and the ‘Antonis Tritsis’ programs, the central state “systematically refuses to turn over to local government the entirety of funding that was so unfairly removed during the memorandum years, of nearly 60%.”
Addressing himself to the Interior Minister, who attended the congress, he said, “We were very happy to hear the announcement you made in the recent conference we held in Athens that the committee for the drafting of the new Local Government Code has been convened and met once already. We believe that the time has finally come to turn into action what the current government has already announced in its first term – the reform in the operation of the state and of local government.” He called that first step in the administrative reform of local government “a brave step towrd the substantive convergence of Greek local government with the European one.”
SOURCE; ANA-MPA
Please wait...