ATHENS: An overwhelming majority of Greek Socialist lawmakers have agreed to vote in favour of contested austerity reforms, party officials told Reuters on Tuesday, sharply increasing the odds of securing parliamentary approval for the measures.
Near-bankrupt Greece needs to push through spending cuts and tax measures worth 13.5 billion euros as well as a raft of reforms to appease EU and IMF lenders and secure bailout money needed to avoid running out of cash next month.
After months of negotiations on the austerity plan, Prime Minister Antonis Samaras announced on Tuesday that talks had been completed and implored his allies to back the package.
The prime minister's New Democracy party and the Socialist PASOK have between them 160 deputies, nine more than they need for an absolute majority in parliament.
But the third party in the coalition, Democratic Left, refuses to back the proposed new labour laws which could tempt other deputies to defect and leave the government facing an unpredictable vote in parliament next week.
However, the odds of parliamentary approval jumped after Socialist PASOK deputies agreed to back the reforms.
"The overwhelming majority of PASOK lawmakers are in favour of the package," one of the party officials said, adding that just two of the 33 PASOK lawmakers would vote against the package, while another two had yet to decide.
Still, a flurry of contradictory statements from the three coalition parties highlighted the chaos ahead of the crucial vote on austerity measures, which has become the government's biggest test since taking power in June.
"What would happen if the deal isn't passed and the country is led to chaos?" Samaras said in a statement.
"Such dangers must be avoided. That is the responsibility of each party and every lawmaker individually."
The Democratic Left party immediately responded by reiterating it would vote against labour reforms.
"The Democratic Left has fought on the issue of labour relations, to protect workers' rights which have been already weakened," the party said in statement.
"It does not agree with the result of the negotiations. The Democratic Left sticks to its position."
PASOK, which has seen its support evaporate in the face of continued austerity, t hen interrupted a party meeting to put out a statement chiding Samaras for saying talks had concluded.
"A rushed press release that says 'the government did what it could, it is moving ahead and whoever wants to should follow it' ... is at best unfortunate," the party's chief said in the statement.
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