ERT crisis threatens to split Greek government

Greece’s governing coalition has been unable to agree on how to re-commence transmissions of shut-down public broadcaster ERT’s programming and could fall over the issue.

The two junior coalition partners, Pasok and the Democratic Left, are at odds with prime minister Antonis Samaras of the New Democracy party, who wants to replace ERT with a new streamlined broadcaster.

The Democratic Left part has said it will likely leave the government, leaving it with a wafer-thin majority and potentially weakening its ability to manage the country’s crisis.

Greece’s Council of State on Monday ordered the government to put ERT back on air ahead of a new broadcaster being created.

ERT HQ