Plaskovitis on Corfu and Athens after Union: Another Big Question

From an article (Kerkyra, Agapi Agerasti), by Spyros Plaskovitis, May 1995, first published in the periodical, I Lexi, no. 127.

Plaskovitis complains that the Greek State failed to take advantage of the enlightened culture of the Ionian Islands after their Union with Greece in 1864. Instead of Athens trying to raise its cultural level to that of Corfu and the Ionian Islands, it chose to close down Corfu's Ionian Academy, the first University in Greece.

The big question some still ask: would Corfu and the Ionian Islands have been better off remaining as a small independent state, rather than being marginalised as a peripheral, non-priority region of a unified Greece?

I'm not sure this is what he had in mind.