Greek election voting begins with New Democracy leadership hopeful

Greece’s ruling New Democracy party is expected to take a clear lead in Sunday’s election, despite a recent scandal and unlikely to come to power immediately under new proportional representation laws.

The centre-right New Democracy, led by Kyriakos Mitsotakis, has been ahead of its main rival, the radical left Syriza party, by at least five points in recent polls, while the centre-left Pasok has come third.

Under electoral laws introduced by the previous Syriza government, a party must win more than 45 percent of the vote to win a majority in the 300-seat Greek parliament. This is unlikely to be achieved on Sunday, meaning a coalition government could be on the cards.

According to the Greek constitution, if there is no outright winner on election day, the party that receives the most votes receives a three-day mandate to form a government through a coalition. Failing that, equal chances are given to the parties with the second and third most votes.

“It will all depend on New Democracy’s results tonight,” said Wolfgango Piccoli, co-chairman of risk analysis company Teneo.

He added, “If Mitsotakis sees that his numbers are low and no government can be formed in the second election, he will aim to secure some coalition in the coming days.”

Mitsotakis, whose reputation has been tarnished after a wiretapping scandal and questions over his handling of a train crash that killed 57 people, has repeatedly said he wants to avoid a coalition and seek a majority government. Will stay outside for

This could be achieved by using a new electoral law introduced by his government to hold a second election, which grants the party with the most votes in the first election up to 50 bonus seats in the second round.

Greek voters are focused on the high cost of living, inflation taking a toll on the population and large numbers of people at risk of poverty or social exclusion.

But it will be the first election in more than a decade that is being held without oversight from European partners. After years of relief packages and austerity measures following the debt crisis, Greece’s economy has made one of the strongest eurozone recoveries from the COVID-19 pandemic and is nearing the investment stage again.

“Macroeconomic progress in terms of growth, low unemployment and falling debt-to-GDP ratios has undoubtedly been maddening over the past four years,” said Dimitris Papadimitriou, professor of political science at the University of Manchester.

“The other side is the cost of living. , , Greek average wages are very low despite the fact that unemployment has plummeted, leading to the second worst purchasing power parity in the EU, bettered only by Bulgaria,” he said.

Syrian leader Alexis Tsipras is still widely remembered as the politician who, during his first year in office, sided with EU officials to nearly pull Greece out of the euro.

“Syriza has been unable to convince voters that they can provide a better economic formulation than New Democracy’s proposal,” Piccoli said.

“Their message was confusing and the opportunity to use the economic card was completely missed,” he said.

If a second election is held, it is expected to be held in late June or early July.