01-11-16  Pantis  sends charges of bogus scholarships to prosecutor

Education Ministry General Secretary Yannis Pantis this morning submitted a report to an Athens lower court prosecutor regarding an anonymous charge that had been submitted to the ministry, regarding possible fraud in the implementation of the scholarships programme administered by the Federation of Educators-Tutors of Greece in cooperation with the SKAI radio and television company (through SKAI’s “All together we can”) programme.

Pantis in his document asks the Athens prosecutor’s office to investigate whether there is criminal responsibility of the institutions offering the supposed scholarships, and whether prosecution is warranted.

According to the information in the anonymous charge, whereas 10,000 scholarships were offered for two academic years, the scholarships awarded were no more than 1,000, and possibly much fewer. In the event that the charge is true, there is a responsibility to the students who participated in the said scholarship programme, as the small number of scholarships demonstrates that the applicants competed in vein, and indeed with no regard to their grade scores.