Greece Finance Minister resigns after `no’ vote

Greece Finance Minister, Yanis Varoufakis, on Monday announced his resignation after Greeks voted ‘no’ to eurozone debt management plans referendum.

He said Athens through social media that Prime Minister, Alexis Tsipras, judged this decision “to be potentially helpful to him in reaching an agreement.

The announcement came hours after the ballot count of the referendum on Greece’s bailout package was completed.

“The ‘no’ vote got 61.31 per cent of the vote, while ‘yes’ got 38.69 per cent, according to the Interior Ministry in Athens.

“The turnout was 62.5 per cent,’’ he said.

Observers believed that Varoufakis’ resignation served as a sign of Athens’ willingness to resume negotiations with a clean slate.

Managing Director of analysts Teneo Intelligence, Wolfango Piccoli, said Tsipras had made a `constructive start,’ pointing to the Greek Prime Minister’s ‘moderate victory speech and now Varoufakis has been pushed out.
He said the next and bigger challenge for Tsipras would be to convince Berlin that he can be trusted and that he can deliver.

Tsipras was set to meet the leaders of political parties Monday morning.

Greek government spokesman Gabriel Sakellaridis said Varoufakis’ successor would be announced after the leaders’ meeting.

The eurozone finance ministers are to meet to discuss Greece followed by a summit of the 19 eurozone leaders at 1600 GMT.

NAN