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Wageningen Greek want to have a say

Many Greek students and employees are annoyed that they won’t have a vote in the referendum on 5 July, as Resource discovered when asking around on campus.
Rob Ramaker,Linda van der Nat

‘I would like to vote,’ says Erasmus student Christina Chairistanidou, who ironically will be returning home the next day. Charles El-Zeind, a Student Council member on behalf of S&I, also thinks it is a pity that he will not get the chance to have a say. ‘It’s an incredibly diffi cult choice but a very important one.’ That is a view widely shared among the Greeks in Wageningen.

But there are also students who actually try and avoid news about the referendum. ‘There came a point when I stopped reading or watching the news,’ says Evangelia Konstantinidou, a Master’s student in Leisure, Tourism and the Environment. ‘It’s been just the same for fi ve years now.’ At the moment, she mainly feels disappointment; she has stopped getting angry or frustrated about the situation. Konstantinidou thinks it is particularly sad that so many talented young people who could do something for Greece have emigrated.

Measures were introduced in Greece last weekend to stem the fl ow of capital out of the country. It is no longer possible for businesses or private citizens to transfer money overseas, and they are allowed to draw out a maximum of 60 euros per day from ATMs. This means Greek students in Wageningen can longer receive money from their families without getting special permission. The Student Service Centre has not yet received any cries for help from students in diffi – culties, says administrator Hans Erik de Kort. But the centre has noticed in recent years that Greek students would rather pay cash – which is not possible. De Kort expects this trend to continue.

Greek Erasmus students rarely have Dutch bank accounts. For them the current situation is confusing, reports The Guardian, because Greek banks do not all interpret the rules on capital transfer in the same way. At some banks it is no longer possible to make payments abroad, even with a credit card. Other banks observe the daily limit of 60 euros and still others do not impose an upper limit. About 40 to 60 Greek students embark on a Master’s programme in Wageningen every year. At a total of 154 students, this makes them the biggest group of EU students apart from the Germans. There are also 41 Greeks working at Wageningen UR, many as guest workers. The limits on money transfer do not affect these employees much as they are paid by Wageningen UR, directly into a Dutch bank account.

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