By Eleftheria Tiliakou, No Filter
The Municipality has just unveiled a modern website and new digital services that could genuinely improve daily life for citizens — yet the communication strategy of the Municipal Authority is still stuck in the same worn-out loop: “we respond to whoever criticises us.” No vision. No priorities. Only defense.
Kalymnos is taking the most significant digital leap of the last decade, and at the same time, the Municipal Authority insists on communicating as if it is under permanent siege. The past week highlighted this contradiction perfectly. Yesterday, the President of ANEK called a press conference to voice his distress over legal troubles triggered by the opposition. He reassured them that he wouldn’t pursue legal action in return but requested a favor from his accusers.Meanwhile, the Municipality’s new website and digital services barely earned a whisper of attention, buried inside a single press release.
We’ve seen the pattern before: the reduction of the landfill fine from roughly €700,000 to €20,000, a major development that the Municipal Authority almost kept as a state secret.
The new website, the digital services, the e-Gov portal, the GIS system, the chatbot, the public consultation tools — none of this is minor. This is real work.These are tools that help the citizen in practice, not in slogans. These are steps that, if announced by a mainland municipality, would be hailed as “innovative” and “exemplary”.
And yet here, these advances sail by almost unnoticed. Why?
Because the Municipal Authority isn’t doing politics. It’s doing damage control.
Like a leadership that wakes up every morning to “respond” to someone:
— a statement from the opposition,
— a Facebook post,
— a hint,
— a rumour.
The image is unmistakable:
When you have real work but are afraid to talk about it, something isn’t right.
When your biggest concern isn’t what you deliver, but who might criticize you, you’re not governing — you’re reacting.
The opposition, for its part, behaves like a permanent factory of discontent: noise, accusations, tension, toxicity. The paradox is that the major opposition party is practically invisible, while the minor one is constantly centre stage — and the Municipal Authority makes sure to keep it there.
That’s the comedy of the situation:
On an island making a genuine step into digital transformation, political discourse is still stuck in the era of fax machines. With the tone of an old TV panel and an agenda obsessed with the micro-bruises of each side.
But the real issue is simple.
If the Municipal Authority cannot communicate its own achievements, then citizens must demand it: demand information about results, not quarrels. Demand a municipality that speaks constructively, not suspiciously. Demand a political culture that is not afraid to say the word “progress”.
Society needs something different. It needs to hear that the Municipality can produce work that isn’t reduced to excuses or low blows. It needs a political climate capable of acknowledging progress — whether it comes from the opposition or the administration. It needs a positive narrative that can say, without fear or complexes: “Yes, this was done well.”
The new digital Municipality is a fact.
The question is whether a new political discourse will follow — or if the 21st-century services will once again be forced to coexist with the mindsets of the 1980s. Technology has moved us forward. It’s time for our politics to catch up
