April 25: time for another big change?

Forty-one years on from the joyous Carnation Revolution that ended half a century of dictatorship, the Portuguese are unhappy. According to the latest Eurostat opinion poll on the subject, the only less happy people in the whole of the European Union are the Bulgarians

“Overall, how satisfied are you with your life these days?” the Eurostat poll wanted to know. The answers showed that the least dissatisfied were those in the 16 to 24 age group.

Of course the respondents did not include the young who have left in droves to seek work and a better life abroad. Nor did the poll take into account the birth rate in Portugal, which is the lowest in Europe and well below the death rate, another factor adding to the growing vacuum of desperately needed dynamism and innovation.

The over-50s - the pre-revolution generation - registered the greatest dissatisfaction, according to Eurostat. Ask them now about the ‘old days,’ and they will tell you that everyday life has greatly improved and become much easier in many ways, but gone backwards in others.

Around the time of the revolution, most people at least nominally still believed in God. Now they find it hard to believe in anyone in authority, especially politicians. Salazar seems like a saint compared to the recent and current crop of administrators.

Strict authoritarian rule has gone, but a more insidious kind of control in the form of bureaucratic regulations at every turn is now limiting freedom. Small businesses will certainly attest to that.

The high hopes of 1975 have been replaced by widespread despair. Few working people will find much to celebrate on o Dia da Liberdade this year.

Foreigners unaware of Portugal’s long history steeped in oppression find it strange that pessimism and low self-esteem should be so prevalent in a culture that these days is one of Europe’s most open, welcoming and tolerant.

Some Portuguese argue it is time for another transformation, not initiated by idealistic young army officers, but by a groundswell of public opinion demanding a fundamental change in economic and social conditions to end the debilitating status quo.

Ironically, part of this is due to membership of the European Union, which for two decades from 1986 opened the country to greater stability, confidence and wealth - until it all started to come crashing down in 2008.  

Just before the 1974 revolution, Portugal’s economy was growing at well above the European average. Second only to Greece, it is now reckoned to be Europe’s most vulnerable.    

The hollowed-out middle class and those at the lower end of this deeply unequal society have taken the brunt of the austerity measures imposed by the government at the behest of the International Monetary Fund, the European Commission and the European Central Bank.

It was the previous Socialist government that agreed to aid at a terrible price from the Troika. Since the last election four years ago, the right-of-centre coalition leader Pedro Passos Coelho has been unswerving in his commitment to Portugal’s bailout programme.

In the face of political and public opposition to austerity and harsh structural reforms as the remedy to the sovereign debt crisis, the government has stuck to its guns. Along with Ireland and Spain, the government in Portugal has rejected Greece’s antagonistic efforts to gain special concessions. In seeking to create economic and fiscal stability, Portugal has adhered to the agreed hard terms.

The Socialist leader António Costa says that far from being a panacea, the bailout programme has been a deplorable failure that has produced nothing but poverty and misery.

For what it’s worth, Central European Bank president Mario Draghi thinks Portugal is a success story for the European Union’s financial policies.

“Portugal has reached the stage where it is fully reaping the benefits of the measures that have been undertaken in the past years,” he said.

Despite such talk, the lack of public confidence in authority and the division of opinion over the way the government is handling the country’s economic and social woes run deep.  

Yet there seems little appetite as in Spain to follow Greece and switch to a radical new party to replace the entrenched two-party system. A hung parliament in Portugal’s next general election this autumn could even result in a grand coalition, as tried in 1983-85 under Mário Soares and now in operation in Germany.

In announcing his candidacy as an independent in next January’s presidential election, businessman and former Socialist member of parliament Henrique Neto made the point that both sides of the political spectrum need to be utilised to solve Portugal’s problems.

The most pressing of the problems include unemployment, currently running at 13.5% overall, 35% among the young. As ever, corruption at all political and social levels is appalling.

Corruption is the country’s “biggest evil,” according to the former deputy mayor of Porto Paulo Morais who has also announced his candidacy for president of the republic. He has said he wants to “increase transparency” and “recover the respect for the main constitutional principles that have become systematically forgotten.”

Wider worries persist over the very future of the Eurozone as Greece wobbles ever closer towards default and a likely exit from the euro. Yet more crunch talks between EU finance ministers are being held this week, but commentators are unanimous that time is running out.
       All is not lost for Portugal. Aside from the real possibility of a Eurozone meltdown, much depends on the outcome of the autumn general election. Anxiety and tension prevailed from the turmoil of 25th April 1974 until the first free elections in 1975 and 1976. Maybe history will repeat itself. Perhaps some real relief and hope for better days will be forthcoming. 

 25^th April 1974, celebration…..

…..  protests four decades later

Günter Grass, creative to the very end

The renowned German writer, artist and activist Günter Grass, who has died at the age of 87, had a long and warm association with the Algarve.

His passing on Monday in the northern German city of Lübeck brought to an end an extraordinarily creative career steeped in both accolades and acrimony.

In contrast to his formidable presence in Germany, Grass was always a low-key figure in the Algarve, a place he appreciated as a peaceful working retreat.

He first came to international prominence in 1953 with his audaciously inventive novel The Tin Drum. Thirty years later and having published many more books, short stories, plays and poems, he became an Algarve holiday homeowner.

On befriending fellow-Germans Marie and Volker Huber, founders in 1981 of the Centro Cultural São Lourenço near Almancil, Grass held exhibitions there for decades.

Marie Huber recalled this week that during well-planned visits with his large family two or three times a year, Grass always busied himself writing, sketching and painting.

An exhibition of his sketches, watercolours, prints and sculptures was showing at the São Lourenço cultural centre in 1999 when it was announced by the Swedish Academy that Grass had been awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature.

He celebrated his 75th birthday in the Algarve in 2002 with a retrospective, his tenth one-man show at São Lourenço. It opened with a reading by Grass from his latest novella, Im Krebsgang (Crabwalk). The Palácio de Galaría in Tavira was the venue for a major exhibition the following year.

By then Grass had moved from his original holiday home in Estômbar, near Lagoa, to a self-designed haven surrounded by nature in the foothills of Monchique.

Grass was“a very gentle man,”Marie Huber recalls. Others in the Algarve have commented on his quiet friendliness, his love of storytelling and his sense of humour.

In Germany and elsewhere he was a much more confrontational and often stridently outspoken character.

At a Council of Europe meeting the year after his Nobel Prize, he denounced the bigotry shown towards the Roma people, Europe’s largest ethnic minority for whom he set up a foundation.

Without compromise he campaigned for global disarmament, but admitted he had been too hasty in warning that German reunification might once again threaten world peace.

Accusations of hypocrisy accompanied the row that erupted in 2006 when he revealed in his memoir Peeling the Onion that as a teenager he had served as a tank gunner in the Nazi Waffen SS.

In 2012, at the age of 84, he was declared persona non grata in Israel following publication of a prose poem called What Must Be Said in which he criticised Israel as being a threat to world peace because of its nuclear capability and hostility towards Iran.

A few weeks later in a poem entitled Europe’s Disgrace, he chastised his own country’s treatment of debt-ridden Greece, which he called “a country sentenced to poverty.”

That same year, the São Lourenço cultural centre sadly closed and, because of heart problems and advancing age, the otherwise indomitable Grass was never able to visit his cherished Algarve again.

The writing did not end there, however, for he was working on a new book during his last days. He died, of a lung infection, surrounded by his family.

He is survived by his second wife, Ute Grunert, four children from his first marriage to Anna Margareta Schwarz, two stepchildren from his second marriage, two children born to other partners, and 18 grandchildren.

Grass at a book fair in Germany last month

Portugal welcomes Iran nuclear deal

 The hopes expressed by Portugal earlier this year of  an agreement on nuclear enrichment between Iran and the world’s major powers looks like coming to fruition.

Portugal’s hopes were based on its burgeoning new relationship with the Islamic Republic of Iran that began just a couple of months before last week’s breakthrough deal in Lausanne, Switzerland.

Under an historic framework arrangement with the United Nations Security Council, Iran, still regarded by some as a pariah state, has agreed to limit its nuclear programme.

Critics, most notably Israel, Saudi Arabia and Republicans in the United States, believe the deal shows far too much leniency towards Iran. That is not Portugal’s view.

In essence, Iran has agreed to curtail uranium enrichment in exchange for the phased lifting of international sanctions.

It is clear that Iranian scientists have the engineering capability to enrich their stockpile of uranium to the high level required to make nuclear weapons. The agreement may not change that capability, but it will entice Iran to stick to its stated intention of limiting enrichment to the level needed to generate electricity from nuclear power.

Iran’s nuclear expertise, materials, laboratories and factories developed over the past 15 years remain intact, but the preliminary promise reached last week means they will be subject to regular inspections and monitoring by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

The deal so far is only an unwritten preliminary understanding. A formal, comprehensive accord is expected at the end of next month.

It will lead to the lifting of nine years of UN sanctions and isolation that have crippled Iran’s economy. Both the EU and the US have indicated they will start to lift sanctions as soon as the IAEA verifies that Iran is complying with its side of the bargain.

During the last few months of tough diplomacy featuring the United States, China, Russia, Germany, France and the UK, Portugal has been quietly promoting bilateral relations and expanding co-operation with Iran on cultural, scientific, sports and tourism fronts.

On a visit to Tehran in late January, Portuguese Foreign Minister Rui Machete met with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani and with cultural and business leaders.

Machete said that all countries, including Iran, were entitled to have access to civilian nuclear technology. In the foreign minister’s words, Portugal “totally encouraged” the intensifying talks aimed at a negotiated solution. 

Iranian Culture Minister Ali Jannati said there was “a solid base for expansion of bilateral relations and the two countries can promote their all-out co-operation in the next years.”

A memorandum of understanding was signed under which the University of Lisbon and the University of Tehran will establish educational and research exchange programs for students and professors. Direct flights between Lisbon and Tehran were among the other subjects discussed.

The proposals were all relatively modest but still highly significant as this was the first visit by a Portuguese diplomatic delegation to Iran in 40 years.

Machete commended President Rouhani for all the reforms the Iranian leader had undertaken. “Hassan Rouhani has succeeded in depicting a new image of Iran on the international scene and highlighted Iran’s role in the region by increasing relations and proposing initiatives,” Machete said.

The visit was seen as a turning point in bilateral relations and the highlight was the observation by both Rouhani and Machete that Iran and Portugal could provide a bridge between the Middle East and Europe.  

In a loosely related move a month earlier, Portugal’s parliament had passed a motion to join other legislative assemblies in the EU in recognising Palestine as an independent and sovereign state. The motion noted that negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians were essential if security and peace in the region were to be realised.

All this must now be seen in the context of the widening and worsening situation across the Middle East.

The re-election last month of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyanhu has done nothing to increase the likelihood of Palestinian statehood or lessen Palestinian-Israeli distrust. 

In their bid for greater influence in the region, Iran and its archenemy Saudi Arabia continue to fuel sectarian violence in Iraq, Syria, Jordan and most recently Yemen.

Portugal’s willingness to help link Iran with Europe and the wider world is for now obscured by rampant chaos and bitter confrontation in the Middle East, but it will continue to offer a modicum of hope.  

 Foreign Minister Rui Machete and 

President Hassan Rouhani in Tehran

Is the Madeleine case to be shelved?

The chairman of the Metropolitan Police Federation, John Tully, is concerned about the Operation Grange investigation into the disappearance of Madeleine McCann but, contrary to press reports, he has not called for the investigation to be closed.

What is in question is the scale of the operation in the light of severe budget cuts and other demands on the Met. But there is no indication that the investigation is to be terminated.

The Daily Star sparked confusion and a flurry of speculation with an “exclusive” under the headline: “Police urged to shelve Maddie hunt as cops needed in UK to battle terrorism.”

The headline inferred it, but the story did not quote Tully or anyone else as saying the investigation should be shelved.

Following up on the Star story the next day, the Daily Mail Online reported that Tully had called for the probe to be axed.  

The Leicester Mercury, the regional paper where Kate and Gerry McCann live, did not mince its words either: “A police union boss has called for London officers to give up the search for Madeleine McCann.”

Other papers, both in the UK and Portugal, churned out the latest fabrication in a mystery that has become a deep-rooted international obsession.

Asked by Portugal Newswatch about what he actually said to  the press, the federation chairman was adamant:

“At no time did I suggest that operation Grange should be closed.”

What Tully was getting at when speaking with the Daily Star was the wisdom of devoting a team of detectives exclusively to the investigation of a crime that had nothing to do with London.

He said he made his comments “in the light of the force having to save £1.4 billion from the budget.”

He added: “The pressure of work and expectation placed on officers, including the unacceptable situation where other officers are carrying in excess of 30 live investigations, is also an important consideration in these circumstances.”

The Metropolitan Police press bureau confirmed there are currently 31 officers working on Operation Grange and that “their sole investigation is the disappearance of Madeleine McCann.”

For now at least, the search for any scrap of solid evidence goes on. DCI Nicola Wall, who took over as head of Operation Grange at the end of last year, was reported in the UK and Portugal media as visiting Lisbon last week to “strengthen links” and for “detailed discussions” with Portuguese prosecutors.

The Week magazine described the talks as “crucial” and said they were designed to “work out next steps” in the investigation. The magazine went on to quote a statement from Kate and Jerry McCann: “It’s very apparent that the determination of the Metropolitan Police remains steadfast.”

Originally requested by Home Secretary Theresa May with the backing of Prime Minister David Cameron, the Met investigation has been ongoing for almost four years at the reported cost to British taxpayers of £10 million. 

There are no indications that the Met are any nearer to solving the mystery. It is not at all clear where the operation is at, or where it is going. All the Met’s press office will say is that “we are not prepared to give a running commentary on this investigation.”

Frustration over the lack of progress is palpable.

The Daily Star accurately quoted Tully as saying it was time to re-focus on what was needed to keep London safe. The Met no longer have the resources to conduct specialist inquiries all over the world, which have nothing to do with London.

“The Met has long been seen as the last resort for investigations others have struggled with elsewhere. But we have made £600m of cuts. We have closed 63 police stations across London. Another £800m of cutbacks are anticipated over the next four years.”

Tully went on to say: “It is surprising to see an inquiry like the McCann investigation ring-fenced. I have heard a few rumblings of discontent about it from lots of sources. When the force is facing a spike in murder investigations it is not surprising there is resentment of significant resources diverted to a case that has no apparent connection with London.”

Officers in London are said to be “bemused” about why they are working round-the-clock solving murders and fighting the threat from Islamic State-inspired jihadists while the Operation Grange detectives are barred from helping.

Meanwhile, almost eight years after Madeleine went missing, a great many people in Portugal as well as the UK and elsewhere are bemused about why the mystery remains unresolved. 

Portugal joins St Patrick’s spectacular

The Portuguese and the Irish have more in common than you might think. It’s not just that they inhabit small lands on Europe’s western edge, have a long Catholic history, revel in tradition and have a penchant for getting themselves into terrible debt.

The Portuguese and the English famously claim the world’s oldest alliance. Despite a fracas or two along the way, this diplomatic accord has been in place for hundreds of years.

It turns out, however, that the Portuguese and the Irish have been rather more than just good friends for thousands of years.

Recent scientific research has all but banished the notion that the Irish are descendants of Celtic people who migrated to the Emerald Isle from central Europe during the Iron Age. DNA analyses suggest instead that the inhabitants of Ireland have a distinctive Atlantic heritage shared with the Celtiberians of Portugal and Galicia that dates back to the end of the last Ice Age.

So it is appropriate that this year’s ‘global greening’ celebration to mark Ireland’s national day, March 17, in honour of St Patrick, has been intensified in Portugal.

For this the sixth global greening, the number of iconic Portuguese landmarks flood-lit in Ireland’s national colour has been increased from one to three: the statue of the Duque da Terceira in central Lisbon, the  monument of Christ the King in Almada on the south bank of the Tagus, and the Palace Museum Condes de Castro de Guimarães in Cascais.

The worldwide total of 125 sites bathed in green in 25 countries includes the Coliseum in Rome, the Sacré Coeur in Paris, the Empire State Building in New York, the leaning Tower of Pisa, the London Eye, Niagara Falls, the Grimaldi Palace in Monaco and Christ the Redeemer Statue in Rio de Janeiro. 

The lights came on at sunset on the eve of St Patrick’s Day and will continue in some places, including Cascais, until Saturday.

From long ago, and at times due to severe domestic hardships much worse than Troika-imposed austerity, Ireland became one of the world’s greatest sources of hard-working immigrants.

“More than 70 million people around the world claim links to the island of Ireland and St. Patrick’s Day is a truly unique opportunity to reconnect them with their heritage,” said Anne Webster, the Irish Ambassador to Lisbon, on the eve of this year’s celebration.

 She pointed out that amid all the colour and the craic, there was good reason to raise glasses to Ireland’s prosperity as it overcomes its problems within the eurozone.

“Our economic recovery has gained a strong momentum in the past 12 months, based on solid growth and job creation, We had the fastest growing economy in the European Union in 2014, with GDP growth of almost 5%, and we expect to retain this lead position in 2015. 

“Unemployment continues to fall from a peak of 15.1% to its current level of 10.1%. Export levels are higher than before the crisis. Our public finances are now on a stable and sustainable footing and we have access to normal financial market funding, at record-low interest rates. Consumers, businesses, investors and global markets have renewed confidence in our economic future.”

Cloaking historic shrines in green makes good business sense too. As the newspaper Diário Ecinómico put it: “It’s an Irish trademark which is seducing more and more countries - and tourists.”

 Ambassador Webster spoke of an international wave of media coverage, with images of greened landmarks in print, TV, online publications and social media, having a hugely important economic and tourism impact at a time when many are planning their overseas holidays.

“This is a joyous two-way process, as images of Lisbon’s magnificent monuments are transmitted internationally, at prime time, to a vast, appreciative and engaged audience.”

But the real significance of the greening in Portugal is of even more fundamental importance: “When you see the beautiful monuments of this region light the night skies with their cloaks of sparkling green, I invite you to think of Ireland, and of the strong bonds of history and friendship which unite our two countries,” said Mrs Webster.

Lá Féile Padraig oraibh go leir!

Happy St. Patrick’s day to all!

Ambassador Anne Webster and President  Cavaco Silva

Palace Museum Condes de Castro de Guimarães 

Monument of Christ the King

Statue of the Duque da Terceira 

EU on the brink, but the show goes on

As much as we distrust them, politicians are keeping us entertained and often on the edge of our seats. The main criticism is that some of the performances are just so bizarre you couldn’t make them up.

In Portugal, the current prime minister Pedro Passos Coelho and his predecessor José Sócrates have been indulging in a slanging match reminiscent of a Punch and Judy show.

For those who have missed recent episodes, Passos Coelho has been squirming his way out of criticisms that he failed to declare a series of tax debts.

“I’m not a perfect citizen, I have my imperfections,” the prime minister admitted amid cries for his resignation,

But hang on, others have imperfections too!

“I never used my position as prime minister to hide differential treatment from any citizens, or to enrich myself, make pay-offs or to live beyond my means,” Passos Coelho explained with a twinkle in his eye.

 Retaliating from his prison cell where he has been languishing while investigations continue into allegations of corruption, tax fraud and money laundering, Sócrates castigated Passos Coelho for making “a cowardly personal attack.” He accused the prime minister of “moral depravity.”

With men like this in charge, it is little wonder that critics at home and abroad have viewed Portugal’s economic performance in recent years as wonky if not farcical. 

On the bigger stage, European unity appears to be careering towards the abyss once again despite the interim agreement reached during last month’s Greek melodrama in Brussels.

As you will recall, the eurozone stepped back from the brink by reaching a compromise deal in which Greece was given a four-month extension to its bailout package. In return, Greece agreed to specify the economic reforms it will undertake, rather than copping out of austerity altogether as Tsipras had promised his electorate.

It is still open to question whether Tsipras was reneging on his pledge to Greek voters or trying to tactically outsmart the Troika. Perhaps to deftly deflect such questions domestically, he accused the governments of Portugal and Spain of conspiring to topple his radical regime because they feared the rise of anti-austerity parties in their own countries.

From Portugal’s standpoint, this sounded like Greek gobbledegook. Despite widespread public anger and street demonstrations over the severe austerity measures, there does not seem to be any real appetite in this country to go down the Greek route. A recent opinion poll shows that the centre-right Social Democrats and centre-left Socialists are running neck-in-neck, far ahead of all the smaller parties.

The most extraordinary outcome envisaged by the political pundits in Portugal is a hung parliament in the autumn election, resulting in a grand coalition between the big two. Even Passos Coelho is not ruling it out. “I’m not closing any doors, but I’m not going to draw scenarios,” he said.

Such a coalition would match what happened after last year’s election in Germany. Some commentators are forecasting a coalition between the Tories and Labour after May’s election in Britain. It could also happen this year in Spain.

The present Spanish government has more reason to ‘conspire’ because it faces a very real threat from the radical left in the shape of the anti-austerity Podemos party, which is enjoying a massive surge in popularity and currently leading the opinion polls in Spain.

The Spanish prime minister, Mariano Rajoy, has not ruled out a grand coalition between his conservative party and the main opposition socialists, though, as in other coalition-prone countries, eyes are on Germany where serious cracks have started to appear.

As for Tsipras’ conspiracy theory, his insulting remarks sent the European Commission scurrying around in an effort to patch things up.

A Commission spokeswoman told reporters: “We are now in close contact with all actors involved [her words, not mine]... in order to ensure there is unity among EU member states and especially among the EU states of the eurozone.”

A spokesman for the German finance minister sounded very upper crust English when tut-tutting about Tsipras’ accusation. “By European standards, this was very unusual foul play. We don't do that in the eurogroup, that’s not appropriate,” he said.

To his many fans, Greece’s hairlessly handsome Yanis Varoufakis was the star of the first acrimonious instalment of the finance ministers’ melodrama in Brussels. Just before the second instalment got underway this week, a spokesman for Greece’s main opposition party shattered Varoufakis hopes of an Oscar by saying he should be replaced because “he doesn’t know what he is talking about..... every time he opens his mouth he creates problems for the negotiating position of the country.”

The poker-playing Varoufakis smiled and added to the ongoing intrigue by saying his two-month-old government was willing to hold a referendum or even early elections if eurogroup ministers reject Greece’s debt and growth plans.

The Dutch finance minister and current eurogroup chief Jeroen Dijsselbloem said the plans were not good enough and that Greece must stop wasting time and start delivering.

“We have spent the last two weeks discussing who will meet who, where and in what configuration. It’s been a complete waste of time,” said Dijsselbloem following this Monday’s Brussels meeting, which broke up in disarray after little more than an hour.

Greek particpants insisted the meeting had been a success. And as if confirming that wonders never cease,Varoufakis revealed that representatives of the hated Troika would be welcome in Athens for technical discussions, even though his governement previously said it would no longer have anything to do with the Troika.

No harm in hoping all this eventually turns out to be a horror story with a happy ending. On the other hand, if Greece exits the EU, it will be much more than just a Greek tragedy.

Meanwhile, the show goes on.   

Understanding economics histrionics

For those of us not savvy when it comes to serious money matters – which includes many more people than you might think – these are bewildering times.

Journalists, along with estate agents, used to be the most disreputable creatures on the planet. Bankers, economists and politicians now hold this distinction.

The latest avalanche of bad economic news started with yet another international banking scandal, this time engulfing HSBC and tax avoidance shenanigans in Switzerland. Details of the scandal and the ensuring furious political row continue to be exposed by leading news organisations privy to thousands of pages of secret files made available via the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. Feather in the cap.

Trouble is, news of greed and corruption among the rich and powerful has become  so commonplace as to be almost boring.

While some of us were still trying to digest the HSBC turpitude, football fans were treated to the news that Sky Sports dominated a deal for TV rights over the next three years in which the British Premier League will be paid the staggering sum of nearly €7 billion. That works out at €13.5 million per game. The total is 70% up on the last similar auction three years ago and is well over a quarter of Portugal’s bailout debt to the IMF.

The deal means that Premier League players will receive even bigger pay packets than the vast sums they are already receiving. Last year Manchester United’s Wayne Rooney was pocketing €404,000 a week. That’s more than president Barack Obama earns in a year.

Real Madrid has been paying Portugal’s Cristiano Ronaldo €18,200,000 per year. He makes in seven minutes as much as an average wage earner in Portugal makes in a week.

Someone on €1,000 a month would have to work for 1,376 years to earn Cristiano Ronaldo’s annual salary. Put another way, Ronald earned last year the same as an average wage earner in Portugal would have made if he had started working in the year 639AD. Those on the minimum wage of less than €600 a month would have had to start working in 278 BC.

If you don’t believe it, do the sums yourself. Or seek help from the BBC: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-31110113

But all this is small change compared with the potential cost of things going badly wrong with the Greeks. Portugal, like the rest of the European Union, is waiting with trepidation as finance ministers grapple over Greek demands said to be threatening catastrophic consequences not only for the eurozone but the economy globally.

In contrast to the grumbling Greeks, Portugal has gained international brownie points by forging ahead and following Ireland with an early repayment of its IMF bailout loan.

Eurogroup President Jeroen Dijsselbloem told a press conference in Brussels on Monday: “Like Ireland, which recently started its own early repayments to the IMF, Portugal is demonstrating how quickly a country can be back on its own two feet after a successful adjustment program.”

 Greece was the first of several EU countries to ask for financial help. It accepted two massive bailouts subject to certain conditions. Its radical new left-wing government says the conditions have impoverished the country and so it’s not going to abide by them. Other EU countries led by Germany say Greece must honour the deal.

“At the heart of the battle between Greece and its EU partners over its debt crisis are conceptions about morality over debt and economics, issues that have been debated for thousands of years,” according to The Economist.

With the EU perching on the edge of a financial precipice and questions of morality left dangling, Greece’s man-of-the-moment Yanis Varoufakis sat down with other finance ministers in Brussels to play poker. 

Writing in the Guardian as the game with extremely high stakes got underway, Anatole Kaletsky, chairman of the Institute for New Economic Thinking, commented: “Yanis Varoufakis, Greece’s new finance minister, is a professor of mathematical economics who specialises in game theory. But his negotiating technique – unpredictable oscillations between aggressiveness and weakness – is the opposite of what game theory would dictate.

“Varoufakis’s idea of strategy is to hold a gun to his own head, then demand a ransom for not pulling the trigger.

“German and European Union policymakers are calling his bluff. As a result, the two sides have become stuck in a passive-aggressive standoff that has made serious negotiation impossible.”

The acrimonious game collapsed in disarray on Monday and again on Tuesday. Yet the Daily Telegraph for one was predicting some kind of “sweetheart” deal that would be “wrapped in obscure language most eurozone voters won’t grasp.”

If such a deal emerges, it remains to be seen if it bamboozles voters in Portugal who go to the polls in a general election this year amid rising anti-austerity anger in this country.

Could economists not have foreseen all this eurozone malarkey and thus avoided it? one might ask.

Criticism of the economics profession has intensified since the global financial crisis of 2007-2009 leading many to wonder if economists contribute anything significant to society.

So says none other than Robert J. Shiller, Professor of Economics at Yale University and a 2013 Nobel laureate in economics.  He notes that economists failed to forecast most of the major crises in the last century, including the severe 1920-21 slump, the 1980-82 back-to-back recessions, and the worst of them all, the Great Depression after the 1929 stock market crash.

But just in case anyone wants to totally write off economists, Shiller added: “Yes, most economists fail to predict financial crises – just as doctors fail to predict disease. But, like doctors, they have made life manifestly better for everyone.”

So that’s all clear them, isn’t it? Except, of course if you happen to be a Portuguese family on the breadline because of austerity. Meanwhile, the eventual outcome of the Greek mess is anyone’s guess.