Of bailouts and euro battles

June has been the month of the Euro. We have had three weeks of Euro-football while our currency has avoided sliding into a black hole. Perhaps never before were national sentiments expressed so vividly on, and off, the football pitch.

Politics, economics and football make a deadly Molotov cocktail…- Joseph Vella Bonnici

Some may say that football is escapism, opium that alienates the masses. Thank god that people do not live on bread alone. Last month, the two spheres overshadowed each other and on the 22nd day a total eclipse took place. Germany and Greece battled it out to stay in the Euro 2012 competition and advance to the semi-final stage.

A few days earlier, the Greeks had narrowly voted for a pro-bailout government in a second election within six weeks. Had the vote gone the other way, it would have paved the way for Greece to exit the eurozone, pushing the monetary union into complete chaos. The saga goes on and one wonders where the experts who have masterminded the single currency have gone. In the meantime, Greece has become the primary scapegoat.

The Greek people are disappointed and feel let down by their politicians and the EU, especially Germany. They are sad that they continue to be stereotyped as lazy, extravagant, tax-evading leeches living it up in the Med while the Germans toil to boast the strongest economy in the world. The austerity package imposed by the EU and the IMF has thrown the Greek economy in a deep recession and it is estimated that a third of the population now lives below the poverty line. Greece’s economic future is in German hands.

This has raised dormant fears about German hegemony; 70 per cent of Greeks believe that Germany wants to create a “Fourth Reich” (BBC June, 21). Angela Merkel’s stubbornness and insistence on a strict austerity programme is reviving memories of German occupation during the last world war, when thousands of Greeks starved to death.

The Greeks believe that German banks were greedy and equally irresponsible when they provided “easy money” without bothering too much whether the country would be able to pay back its debts. After all, in 1953, Greece was one of the signatories of the London Agreement, which provided debt relief to Germany and paved the way for the reconstruction of the German economy.

Today’s battles are mostly fought in the media; the national media of both countries engaged in extensive mudslinging to add fuel to the antagonism. It was inevitable that the football match between Germany and Greece would get caught in the crossfire. It became the “debt derby”, the “battle of the bailout”, the “real Euro stress test” and “the bailout game”. German tabloid Bild bellowed, “Bye Greece, today we cannot save you”. It added: “Rejoice dear Greeks, defeat will be for free on Friday.” The Berliner Morgenpost declared that “Greeks want revenge… they want a night when big Germany will suffer”.

Greek newspapers urged their team to “push Germany out of the Euro”. Sport Day’s headline read Bankrupt Them. Another sports newspaper sarcastically remarked that “the first measure that our new government has to push through on the urging of Merkel: we have to lose to Germany”.

A cartoon going round the internet depicts a Greek player wearing the national jersey and branding Germany as sponsors. Dimokratia went as far as portraying Angela Merkel in a Nazi uniform. (The Independent of London estimates that more than 50,000 Germans cancelled their summer holiday bookings in Greece for fear of reprisals for their government’s position.).

Greece’s win over Russia and their qualifying for the quarter-finals came as a surprise and boosted the self-confidence of the squad and the nation. The match against Germany assumed a surreal meaning. Striker Georgios Samaras was quoted as saying “We’re playing for the country, for 11 million people waiting for a smile” (The Guardian, June, 21).

Today, Greek football, like the country’s economy and finance, is no match for the Germans, even if the latter’s manager praised the Greek players referring to them as “masters of efficiency”. The value of the German national team players is estimated to be about five times that of the Greeks and if bookmakers’ odds are anything to go by, the chances of Greece winning were 36 to 1. (In 2004, Greece shocked the football world by winning the competition. At the time, they had a German, Otto Rehhagel, as manager.)

Politics, economics and football make a deadly Molotov cocktail, which brings out all the tribalism of supposedly modern societies. Michael Novak, in his book Choosing Presidents: Symbols Of Political Leadership, remarks that American football is “a liturgy that celebrates a nation’s self-consciousness”. So is European football.

Chancellor Merkel made it a point to attend for the game in Gdansk; rescheduling a meeting she had with French, Italian and Spanish leaders in Rome. It was unusual to see a German Chancellor jumping with joy at each of the four goals scored by Germany. Perhaps, she was trying to prove some point. Antonis Samaras, the Greek Prime Minister, had to stay home to undergo surgery for a detached retina. His only consolation on the night was that his namesake scored Greece’s first goal, giving a fleeting fright to the Germans.

It is very hard for David to succeed against Goliath. Once in a blue moon it may happen in football but the odds are even greater in the world of finance.

fms18@onvol.net