CIVICUS discusses protests in Greece with Stefanos Loukopoulos, Director of Vouliwatch, a civil society organisation that monitors parliamentary work and strengthens democratic institutions.

On the second anniversary of a rail crash that claimed dozens of lives, people took to the streets in unprecedented numbers, with the tragedy becoming a flashpoint for deeper frustrations about failings in accountability and democratic governance. No senior officials have faced charges despite mounting evidence of negligence, fuelling widespread anger and calls for systemic change.

How did a tragedy trigger a national protest movement?

The rail disaster in Tempi in February 2023 struck at the heart of Greek society. Beyond the devastating loss of young lives, it exposed critical failures across our entire system. It laid bare the risks of privatising infrastructure and letting private companies operate without sufficient government oversight.

What began as grief rapidly evolved into what’s known as the Tempi Movement, one of the largest grassroots mobilisations in Greek history, and one driven by emotion rather than ideological or material demands. People joined out of solidarity with grieving families, outrage at government negligence and recognition of their vulnerability in a failing system.

What particularly fuelled public anger was the government’s apparent efforts to obscure responsibility by altering the crash site before proper forensic investigation, spreading misinformation through state-friendly media channels and repeatedly changing its narrative as evidence emerged.

The disaster crystallised everything that’s wrong in Greece: endemic corruption, institutional failure, compromised justice and a political class completely disconnected from people’s realities.

How has the government handled the growing protest movement?

Initially, officials attempted to dismiss the movement as politically motivated. They labelled victims’ families as conspiracy theorists and accused them of being manipulated by opposition forces.

This strategy collapsed when independent investigations revealed damning evidence, including undocumented explosives aboard one train and deliberate tampering with the crash site that destroyed critical forensic evidence. As public opinion shifted decisively against the government and its approval ratings plummeted, government rhetoric softened.

However, its fundamental approach remains unchanged: absolute refusal to accept institutional responsibility. This intransigence has only deepened public distrust and strengthened the movement.

What makes these protests different from previous movements?

The Tempi Movement represents a significant departure from Greece’s protest tradition. Rather than being led by established political parties, unions or activist networks, it developed spontaneously, with the Association of Relatives of Tempi Victims emerging as its natural, legitimate driving force.

These families have commissioned independent inquiries, launched coordinated legal challenges, cultivated international media attention and organised nationwide demonstrations that have drawn record attendance.

Unfortunately, established civil society organisations have remained peripheral. This reflects a broader European pattern where formal civil society often lacks resources and social capital to shape large-scale movements. The grassroots nature of the protests has become their defining strength.

How has the movement’s message evolved?

As the movement grew, so did its demands. What began as specific demands for accountability has transformed into a comprehensive critique of a deeply unfair society. The haunting final words of one victim, ‘I have no oxygen’, have become a powerful slogan, because it’s a metaphor that resonates across different groups.

For students and young people in general, ‘no oxygen’ represents suffocating educational prospects. For working families, it captures the struggle to survive economically amid rising prices and stagnant wages. For academics and activists, it symbolises the erosion of democracy, civic space and the rule of law.

The Tempi disaster has functioned as a catalyst, awakening a previously disengaged society. After years of crisis fatigue following the 2009 financial collapse, Greeks are again demanding fundamental reforms to create a more equitable, transparent and democratic system.

 

What factors make meaningful reform difficult?

Greece has an entrenched political culture built on clientelism, nepotism and institutional capture, deliberately cultivated by ruling elites since the modern state’s formation. This has produced nominal rather than functional democratic institutions: compromised checks and balances, media controlled by government-aligned oligarchs and citizen resignation rather than engagement.

In periods of relative prosperity, society tends to tolerate these dysfunctions, creating an illusion of stability. But moments of crisis reveal the system’s brittleness and trigger demands for alternatives beyond established political structures.

We witnessed this during the financial crisis, when SYRIZA, a previously marginal radical leftist party, rose to power and the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn entered parliament. Today’s fragile post-pandemic economy, combined with global instability, has again revealed systemic failures that the Tempi tragedy further helped expose.

The most alarming difference now is the absence of credible democratic alternatives. Without vibrant civil society or trusted political movements to channel public disillusionment constructively, this crisis of legitimacy could end up empowering far-right populist forces.