Designated Finance Minister Drops Out of Greek Cabinet, Citing Health Problems

15 january 2013

ATHENS — Greece’s designated finance minister resigned on Monday after being hospitalized, an unexpected blow to the new government of Prime Minister Antonis Samaras as it struggles to manage the country’s financial crisis.

The designated official, Vassilis Rapanos, 65, is also the chairman of National Bank, the country’s biggest lender. He has had a history of health problems, including cancer, according to Greek news media. On Friday, he was struck by intense abdominal pain, nausea, sweating and dizziness, and on Monday, according to state television, underwent a gastroscopy and colonoscopy.

On Monday, Mr. Rapanos sent a letter to Mr. Samaras saying that he had accepted the appointment “in full knowledge of the problems faced by our economy and the responsibility I was undertaking,” but that “after discussion with my doctors, I reached the conclusion that the state of my health, currently, will not allow me to fully and adequately exercise my duties.”

The resignation is an inauspicious start for Mr. Samaras’s new government as it tries to make good on campaign promises to get Greece’s creditors to ease harsh austerity terms linked to its multibillion-euro bailouts. Mr. Samaras is recovering from an emergency eye operation less than a week after Greece ushered in the new government, and now must scramble to find someone else to fill a post that few people are eager to take.

The finance minister plays a pivotal role in Greece, and is responsible for negotiating with its lenders. The government must immediately find about $14 billion worth of cuts to meet the bailout terms. Greece is quickly running out of cash, and any new official must devise plans to reverse an economic contraction of more than 6 percent and an unemployment rate that has reached 22 percent.

Together with news that Cyprus on Monday became the fifth euro zone country to request a financial lifeline from international lenders in the three years of euro debt crisis, the latest uncertainty in Greece helped drive Wall Street lower during the day.

Mr. Samaras’s office made Mr. Rapanos’s resignation letter public and issued the prime minister’s statement of response. “I wish you a speedy recovery from your health problem and thank you for your willingness to accept the role I assigned you,” the statement said, adding, “I hope you will soon recover your strength to contribute to the national effort.”

It remained unclear who Mr. Samaras would turn to for the crucial position. Representatives of Greece’s so-called troika of foreign creditors — the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund — had already postponed a trip to Athens that was scheduled for Monday, and Mr. Samaras will also miss a crucial European Union summit meeting on Thursday and Friday to discuss whether to ease the terms of Greece’s bailout conditions.