A privately owned space in Ano Patissia became the occasion for a confrontation between Kostas Bakoyannis and Charis Doukas today. Initially, the former mayor of Athens and head of the “Athens Psila” faction uploaded a video on his personal Facebook account, where he visits a plot of land in Ano Patissia with residents and mentions that in 2023 the decision was made for the municipality to enter into negotiations with the owner in order to buy it and turn it into a park. He adds that the current municipal authority has abandoned it, and in the post he wrote:
“In Ano Patisia, a green space becomes… just another apartment building. We had decided that the municipality would buy it up to become a park. The current municipal authority chose not to proceed. Athens doesn’t need any more cement. It needs greenery.”
Shortly afterwards, the Municipality of Athens issued a response statement accusing the former mayor of hypocrisy on this issue. Specifically, it says:
“Mr. Bakoyannis has no right to talk about green. Because the reality is one: he has been deliberately deceiving and defrauding the residents of Ano Patissia. For two years he assured them that ‘everything was going well’, while in practice he did not take any of the necessary steps to proceed with the expropriation. He knowingly let the site go to waste.
Today he continues to misinform citizens. He appears to be denouncing a development for which he is solely responsible and is even asking for change. But history has already been written. Whatever open space he managed, he let it turn to concrete.”
And the statement concludes: “The city really does need more greenery. But it also needs less hypocrisy.”
