Our Party Convention will be held from the 4th to the 6th of December, and it will be open to all. The participants will not be part of the décor, but will be the ones making the decisions.
More than any other party, Potami has proven that it respects and listens to the people that support it. We may have set a worldwide record by holding our first convention four months after the establishment of our party. Since then, we have allowed our local grassroots organizations to develop by themselves their initiatives all over Greece, and the members of our Policy Think Tanks to develop by themselves the political framework of our public interventions. In January’s elections, the lists of our candidates were drawn based on the recommendations of thousands of volunteers. We held more meetings of our Parliamentary Delegation than any other party.
This does not mean that we did not make mistakes. I am the first to admit a series of mistakes and omissions. But, let’s think about it. The Party is only 19 months old, and we accomplished what others have not done in decades. I do not only refer to the four electoral battles that we fought without money, without organization, without protectors. I refer to the quality of the people that we proposed for candidates, our interventions in public life, the new ethics that we imposed from the start in Parliament, the links that we developed with the creative forces of our society. These were not accomplishments of “Stavros”, nor of "Stavros' group of friends”, nor of the "the party central organization". We accomplished all these, all of us, together.
At this point, our rivals want Potami on its knees. We must give them an answer: Potami is here to stay, in order to change everything. To change everything in the country, in society and, of course, within the party itself.
I will not tell you in this letter about the changes that I propose to the organizational structure and to the party statutes. I plan to attend every regional meeting, and thus we will have the chance to discuss, face to face “what party we want”. We must change many things. But, be careful. We do not alter our course, because we got only 4% in the elections. We know, and everyone admits it, that this retreat was circumstantial.
We had planned the Convention for September, but because of the elections that came up, we had to postpone it until December. I am sure that what I have in my mind is what you think and talk about: a modern party, where everyone will have a say, a movement of active citizens that will discuss, will agree or disagree, will decide and act. With open doors, and with clear procedures. No factions and "insiders", but equal participants. However, certain things must ripen. We are not machines that execute plans. We are citizens that are building a custom-made political party. We do not copy other models. We create our own.
From the start, we had said: it is groups of friends that write history. And our group is large. It is all of us who founded and joined Potami. Our objective is victory. A strong Potami that will be defining the political developments in our country.
In the near future, we will be attacked by those who partake of the honey of power, by the "vested interests" that play with marked cards and always win. Potami will continue to be the target of mudslinging. This started from day one by certain SYRIZA members, together with certain far-right elements, but they were joined later by many others. Even Mrs. Fofi Gennimata, in pre-election speeches, referred to Potami as the “blurry river” with “unknown sources”. Certain New Democracy members repeated such nonsense, which no serious person should entertain. Yet, in the Greece of the crisis, it found fertile ground. Our mistake – my mistake – was that we did not react as strongly and as promptly as we should have done. This is because, in the beginning, we used to laugh with their lies. The people that served “special interests” – small or big – were slandering Potami. It is funny, is it not?
So, we have a lot to do this winter. Our "internal" work must not distract us from our objective. Yes, our objective is to protect and develop further what we have created, with the ultimate goal of protecting the interests of the people. Our objective is to prevent the Tsipras – Kammenos duet from bringing about new, irreversible damage to the Economy and to Society. Our objective is major reforms. Another goal is to convince the hundreds of thousands that abstained from voting that bad Prime Ministers are elected by those who do not vote.
Potami lost 151.758 votes from January to September. SYRIZA lost 320.074 votes. New Democracy 192.489 votes. The coalition of PASOK and DIMAR lost 130.456 votes.
We must concentrate on "our people" who abandoned us, and on all “our kind of people” who never came to us, who must stop being insecure about the new. Most people prefer to hold on to the things they know. Changes scare them and make them uncomfortable. This is why the “new” has always been the realm of the pioneers and the brave, and this is what you are.
Our Convention will be an opportunity to show what we mean by open political parties, what we mean by collaboration. We will give the opportunity to all, and especially to young people, to participate. We will find the way and I promise you that, once again, we will be innovative and pioneering. Just like when we created the Dialogue Committee, putting into action a collaboration among so many important Greek personalities. Just like when we presented our nation-wide list of candidates. Just like when we included in the Policy think tanks experts who were not members of the party, but who shared our values and concerns. Because, the role of a modern political movement is not to build offices and get entrenched. Its role should be to act as the intermediary between the people and the leadership, so that necessary solutions and actions come from the Society and not from the deep freezers of the political parties.
This is what we will be talking about in the pre-convention meetings. You may be surprised to hear that, after the elections, many who regretted their decision come back to us with renewed vigor. We welcome them back among us.
All together: progressives, liberals, leftist reformers, ecologists, socialists, moderates of the center, realists, the young people who are labeled by the old parties as "apolitical". This time, however, we will proceed in a more organized and methodical way.
We will not disappoint the ones that breathed a sigh of relief when Potami appeared. We will implement the reforms that must be made. We will continue to be the change that we want.
Good work to everyone.
*To our volunteers, members, candidates, friends.
Meaning to all those that I don’t get to meet as often as I would like. We will meet again at our second convention.
Stavros Theodorakis
Photo credit: Theodore Manolopoulos
