Theofanis Tombras

Theofanis Tombras (Greek: Θεοφάνης Τόμπρας, translit. Theophanes Tompras, transcr. Theofanis Tombras or Tobras), 1932 – 8 January 1996) was a Greek Army officer (colonel of signals) who ended up as deputy governor of Hellenic Telecommunications Organization S.A (OTE) (1981–1984) and finally governor and general manager of OTE (1984–1989). During his tenure, OTE became the highest-revenue state-owned enterprise in Greece. He also oversaw the completion of its large complex in Marousi and the relocation of its operations there.

Tombras spent the last years of his life in his native Argolis, where he engaged in the fruit-processing trade, which he had originally entered in 1982. For all that, he remained active in the affairs of PASOK, especially in view of the succession of Andreas Papandreou in late 1995, where he supported Gerasimos Arsenis. He died of cardiac arrest on 8 January 1996; at the same time Andreas Papandreou was ill and being treated at the Onaseio Cardiac Centre. His funeral was attended by then-Speaker of the Parliament of Greece Apostolos Kaklamanis; then-Minister of Public Order Sifis Valirakis; then-Director of the Greek National Intelligence Service, Admiral Leonidas Vasilikopoulos; PASOK parliamentarians and party members, and Sokratis Kokkalis.

Tombras was cast out of the general directorship of OTE on 2 July 1989, that is, the same day that a new cabinet under Tzannis Tzannetakis came to power.

After the return of the PASOK government in the summer of 1989, Tombras was accused of making deposits totaling to a then-Greek drachma equivalent of $12.5 million USD in OTE money in the Bank of Crete at below-market interest to help shore up the bank's finances, allegedly part of a scheme known as the Koskotas Scandal. Subsequently he was accused of illegal telephone wiretapping of the political opponents of PASOK. On the first charge he was acquitted, and on the second he did not arrive in court because the parliament dismissed the prosecution after the acquittal of Andreas Papandreou in the Koskotas affair and the dramatic change in the political climate in January 1992.

He took part in the resistance to the Greek military junta. After the electoral victory of PASOK in October 1981, he was made a deputy governor of OTE; later in February 1984, he became its governor. After amendments to its articles of organization in 1987, his title was changed to general director.

Theofanis Tombras was born in 1932 in Merbaka (Agia Trias) in Argolis. He graduated from the Hellenic Military Academy and joined the Signal Corps. In the 1960s, as a captain, he served in the predecessor agency to the Hellenic National Intelligence Service and was accused of being a member of the clandestine ASPIDA organization, an accusation of which he was eventually absolved, as he was of accusations of wiretapping the telephone conversations of political opponents of Andreas Papandreou.