The latest acrimonious political melee in Greece erupted on Monday, with a local businessman providing a Parliamentary committee of inquiry with a taped-recorded conversation purportedly between himself and former SYRIZA minister Nikos Pappas, in which the latter allegedly implicates another former minister – and the subject of the committee’s investigation – in a judicial blackmailing scheme.
Sabi Mioni presented the tape recording and a its voluminous transcript to members of the committee investigating former alternate justice minister Dimitris Papaggelopoulos over claims that he oversaw a judicial conspiracy when serving in the Tsipras government, with the main allegation aired by political rivals and a portion of the media being his involvement in the Novartis kickbacks probe by an anti-corruption prosecutor.
Ruling New Democracy party MPs serving on the committee proposed that the tape recording be sent to a relevant high court prosecutor, a proposal backed by the Kinima Allaghis party.
The tape recording has one man, which Mioni claims is Pappas, referring repeatedly to Papaggelopoulos, and saying that by paying for “judicial and legal expenses” all of the probes against the Greek-Israeli businessman would end.
