Dutch economist Maarten Verwey has unprecedented powers as his taskforce oversees the implementation of Greece’s cash-for-reforms rescue package.
Whoever ends up moving into Maximos Mansion, the official Athens residence of Greece’s prime ministers, after Sunday’s election, they will not, in any meaningful sense, be running the country.
That honour might be said to go instead to a besuited Dutch economist in Brussels with the imposing title of director-general in the secretariat-general of the European commission in charge of the Structural Reform Support Service.
Maarten Verwey, a senior civil servant at the Dutch finance ministry who joined the commission in 2011 and led its Cyprus assistance programme, heads what amounts to an EU taskforce for Greece, Greek media have said.
His powers are unprecedented. And if few voters on the streets of Athens have heard his name, many understand that how they cast their ballot in the elections will make little difference to what happens next.
“It’s a done deal,” said Christos Sotirakis, 43, a bank employee. “It doesn’t matter who wins, we know what they’ll be doing. More taxes, more cuts, more austerity. Every party signed up to it. There’s no real point voting.”