Filippos Petsalnikos

Filippos Petsalnikos

Filippos Petsalnikos ( Greek Φίλιππος Πετσάλνικος , * December 1, 1950 in Mavrochori / Kastoria Prefecture ; † March 13, 2020 ) was a Greek politician of the social democratic party PASOK . He was Minister and President of the Greek Parliament on several occasions .

biography

Petsalnikos was born the son of a farmer and studied law at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and the University of Bonn . In 1969, during the military rule in Greece , he was a member of the circle of friends of the PAK liberation movement founded by Andreas Papandreou in the Federal Republic of Germany, chairman of the Association of Greek Students and the Greek Community in Bonn. In 1974 he became one of the founding members of PASOK and was one of the founders of the first organizations of this party in Germany.

After returning to Greece, he practiced as a lawyer in Athens.

Petsalnikos was married to the German lawyer Mariele Biedendieck and had three children.

Political offices

From 1984 to 1985 he was State Secretary for Adult Education in the Greek Ministry of Education. In the 1985 elections, he was elected to the Greek Parliament as a member of Kastoria.

In 2004 and again in September 2007 he was elected one of the Vice-Presidents of the Greek Parliament.

From April 1986 to June 1988 and from December 1988 to July 1989 he was Deputy Minister for National Education and Religious Affairs, from July 1994 to January 1996 Minister of State for Education, then Minister for Macedonia and Thrace until October 1998 and then Minister for until February 1999 public order when he was dismissed from his ministerial post at the instigation of then Prime Minister Konstantinos Simitis because of the Öcalan affair .

He returned to the government as Minister of National Education and Religious Affairs in April 2000 and served as Minister of Justice from October 2001 to March 2004.

After the PASOK in the 2009 parliamentary elections won a majority, he was elected on 15 October 2009 for the President of Parliament. He held this office until May 2012.

Petsalnikos received the Grand Cross of Merit with Star of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany in April 2009 for his services to German-Greek relations - among other things, he was President of the parliamentary German-Greek friendship group.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Nick Kampouris: Former Speaker of the House Filippos Petsalnikos Dies at 70 | GreekReporter.com. Retrieved March 13, 2020 . 
2. ^ Message from the German Embassy in Athens

Web links

• Ta Nea online from October 16, 2009 (Greek)