With the bail out deal agreed, prime minister Tsipras has called for an emergency session of parliament to vote on the new bailout deal on Thursday.
In a letter sent to the speaker of the parliament, Tsipras said he wanted to have the draft law on the bailout submitted later on Tuesday so it can be distributed to lawmakers and then discussed in parliamentary committee on Wednesday before being voted on Thursday.
“The crucial nature of the situation requires the immediate convening of parliament to proceed with the deal’s approval and allow the disbursement of the first instalment,” Tsipras said in the letter published by his government.
Greece is eager to get the deal ratified by parliament in time for euro zone finance ministers to give their approval by Friday, so that aid can be disbursed in time for a €3.1 bn debt repayment to the ECB on Aug.20. all of the first instalment of €20 bn will be repaid back to the institutions as soon as Greece receives it.
Several European Union bodies and the International Monetary Fund are set to lend Greece money so that it can keep paying it back to them.
The Greek parliament has already agreed to a raft of cuts, privatisations and austerity reforms to get agreement for the bailout. But the institutions are demanding more before they seal the deal.
Not everyone in Greece shares the governments sense of accomplishment over the deal.
The Left Platform, the left wing of the ruling Syriza party described the deal as a “a noose around the people’s neck”.
I suspect many of the 61% of the Greeks who voted ‘no’ in the referendum share the feeling.
Left Platform allied MPs are expected to vote against the agreement on Thursday’’s parliamentary vote making a Left Platform split from the party increasingly likely.
Germany remained cautious on the timing for a final deal. “We will have to examine the results that come in the course of today,” deputy finance minister Jens Spahn said on German television .
Commenting on the deal, senior parliamentary ally of Chancellor Angela Merkel, Ralph Brinkhaus said “The more money is handed out in one stroke, the less leverage one has to stop payments if the reform process in Greece does not pan out as planned.”
