Greece’s conservative Nea Dimokratia (ND) party won Sunday’s parliamentary elections called to break the political deadlock caused by last month’s elections.
After counting 95% of the ballots, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis’ party led the way with 40.5% of the vote.
“The people have given us a secure majority. Great reforms will proceed swiftly,” Mitsotakis said in a televised address on Sunday evening.
Speaking to a cheering crowd outside his party headquarters, the 55-year-old former McKinsey adviser promised robust growth that he said would lead to wage increases.
The New Democracy took the lead early on when the first results came in. Image: Sakis Mitrolidis/AFP/Getty Images
Mitsotakis’ party is expected to hold around 157 of the 300 seats in parliament thanks to a re-election law that grants the winning party 50 bonus seats.
In the May elections, Mitsotakis’ party won a landslide victory among individual parties, but fell just five seats short of a single majority in parliament.
Instead of attempting to form a coalition government, Mitsotakis opted to vote again, confident that should a second election be required, Greek rules would improve his chances of an outright victory given how close he was came on the first try.
How did the opposition parties fare?
Around 9.8 million Greek voters had the right to choose from 32 political parties on Sunday.
The coalition of the radical left (Syriza) got around 18% of the vote – a worse result than in the last election in May.
“We suffered a serious electoral defeat,” said party leader Alex Tsipras.
“It goes without saying that I will be the first to face the judgment of party members.”
Alex Tsipras’ Syriza party received the second highest number of votes but still lagged far behind Nea Dimokratia. Credit: Michael Varaklas/AP/Picture Alliance
The centre-left Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK) got almost 13% of the vote, while the Greek Communist Party (KKE) got more than 7% and the ultra-nationalist Spartans party around 5%.
The left-wing party MeRA25, founded by former Syriza finance minister Yanis Varoufakis, failed to pass the 3 percent threshold required to enter parliament.
An expected result
The election came in the wake of a June 14 migrant shipwreck that feared killed hundreds.
Polls before the election had suggested good prospects for the conservative Mitsotakis, who has been Greece’s prime minister since 2019.
He has praised the strong economy under his leadership, and most analysts attribute ND’s strong position to the country’s gradual recovery from around a decade of financial crisis.
Mitsotakis’ first term in office was marked by a return to economic growth and falling unemployment rates in Greece.
Elections in Greece: what are the big issues?
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Syriza was expected to take the second-highest share of the vote, but still lags far behind the ruling party.
Tsipras has criticized Mitsotakis for a wiretapping scandal and migration.
His party’s support dwindled in 2019 after Syriza guided Greece through some of the most turbulent years of its debt crisis.
zc, mf, msh/dj (dpa, AFP, Portal, AP)