Big party names
More than half of the 57 people officially listed as employees of Blue Skies had high-ranking positions close to Mitsotakis or New Democracy at the same time, according to a report in Documento newspaper. None listed their corporate PR roles on their CVs.
In addition to outgoing EPP Secretary-General Bakolas, the names include Minister of Labor and Social Security Domna Michailidou and Deputy Minister of Transport Konstantinos Kyranakis.
Most of them appear to have worked at the company when Mitsotakis took over the party leadership in 2016, and stopped in 2019 when New Democracy was elected and they received official roles. Others, like Orsaki Roussetou, who works in the prime minister’s communications office, continue to appear on the company’s payroll.
When asked specifically about Bakolas, Michailidou, Kyranakis and Roussetou, government spokesperson Pavlos Marinakis dismissed the accusations, saying many party members would naturally receive their income from the private sector when not in a paid party role.
“In New Democracy, a party position, a position, that is, in the party, is not a job. In parallel with this position, people work in the private sector,” he told a press briefing.
The opposition’s objection is that Blue Skies looks like a New Democracy shadow operation, but Marinakis called that allegation “a relic of science fiction.” Instead, he said he supported public officials having experience of the private sector.