George Papandreou bounces back

The last time I saw George Papandreou was here in Istanbul exactly two years ago. He had come to Turkey to be a guest speaker at the annual meeting of the Global Relations Forum (GRF) and delivered a speech in the offices of Rumvader, the association of Greek-Orthodox foundations, in the vicinity of Aghia Triada Church in Taksim.

He was enthusiastically received by his audience, among which were the leaders of other Christian minorities in Turkey. He spoke to them about the richness of religious diversity; he called them ‘cultural bridges' and ambassadors of peace between Greece and Turkey. Everything said was in the spirit of reconciliation and optimism that things are on the right path. Everybody was happy and he received a warm applause.  

Nothing in his demeanor during that gathering showed that this man, only months before, had to bow out from his post as prime minister of Greece in a most dramatic way, under extreme political pressure from the opposition, from his own party and from a large part of the electorate. Why? Because, upon his inauguration, in 2009 he had openly revealed that the situation of his country's economy was much worse than originally thought. This caused a huge blow to Greece's credibility and the nightmarish trip of bailout agreements with the EU, ECB and IMF on conditional to tough austerity measures, began lasting to date.

"Why is he still popular here?" I asked one of the leading figures of Rumvader, who had organized the event with "Little George," as Papandreou is often referred to. "For us, for the Rums, he is somebody who contributed the most to changing the atmosphere between our two countries," the Rum dignitary replied. "We do not care what the Greeks in Greece say. We like him."

He was...