🇬🇷 Greek politics and elections

[oldtimer]

From the first very early results pouring in I can say:

A very territorial opposition breakdown, the Exit Poll could be very off again.

[oldtimer]

23.7% counted:

40.5% ND
17.9% Syriza
13.6% PASOK
  6.9% KKE
  4.6% Spartans
  4.6% EL
  3.7% NIKI
  2.8% PE

You beat me too it.

Im my precinct SYRIZA and PASOK are very very close, so it's what I can see too first hand.

[oldtimer]

Interior Ministry final result projection:

40.5% ND, 157 seats
17.9% Syriza, 48
12.3% PASOK, 33
  7.6% KKE, 20
  4.7% Spartans, 12
  4.6% EL, 12
  3.6% NIKI, 10
  3.1% PE, 8

Just a rearrangement of the opposition deck chairs.

[oldtimer]

Casablanca: "We'll always have Paris"

Syriza: "We'll always have Rodopi"

There was a mini brawl 2 weeks ago when ND accused SYRIZA of being a front for Erdogan and made some vague threats to the local minority in Rodopi to change their vote or else.

[oldtimer]

Well the results won't change much, here it is by ideological faction:

The Right will be up to around 13%, best result since 2012 when they got a combined 18%, way up from pre-crisis levels.

The Left stable at around 14%, same as pre-crisis levels.

The Center Left down to around 30%, worst result since 2012 when they got a combined 19% and way down from pre-crisis levels.

The Center Right stable at around 40%, same as pre-crisis levels.

Bottom line, ND continues to drift left and eat's the Center-Left's pie while losing an equal amount of votes to the right.

The Center Left parties are unable to drift to the right to balance things "american style realignment".

A very typical european result.

Mitsotakis can change the constitution with either PASOK or with the Conservative parties (not the Nazis).

Bonus:

A SYRIZA MP named Xenogiannakopoulou, that spend most of election night on TV saying that Tsipras is a political colossus, lost her seat.

[oldtimer]

Interesting that all the small right wing parties passed the threshold. Are they pretty similar on ideology?

From what I gather, Greek Solution are more aligned with the religious (Orthodox) right wing in Greece.. while Spartans has links with jailed Neo Nazis, formerly of the Golden Dawn.

I made a detailed post a few weeks ago:

The Greek Solution, aka Velopoulos, is the Greek Ancient Aliens party.
Nikki is the Televangelist party.
The Spartans are pure "300 movie" military Nazis, hence the name.

[oldtimer]

Interesting that all the small right wing parties passed the threshold. Are they pretty similar on ideology?

From what I gather, Greek Solution are more aligned with the religious (Orthodox) right wing in Greece.. while Spartans has links with jailed Neo Nazis, formerly of the Golden Dawn.

I made a detailed post a few weeks ago:

The Greek Solution, aka Velopoulos, is the Greek Ancient Aliens party.
Nikki is the Televangelist party.
The Spartans are pure "300 movie" military Nazis, hence the name.

Isn't Greek Solution also deeply Russophile?

Like all Conservative Parties in the West.

Since America and the EU are perceived as lefty liberal, they align with conservative Russia in a reverse of the Cold War.

And oh my I just noticed that there was a party named T.R.U.M.P. with an ejaculating penis as it's symbol, it's getting 1 vote so far.

[oldtimer]

Absolutely devastating results for the Greek Left, Tspiras has got to go and left-wing figures with more broad cross-party appeal need to emerge. Here's hoping Far-Right parties retaking their seats is a fluke like Golden Dawn was.

Tsipras is never resigning.

He's the type who purges everyone to remain Leader of something, even if that something is just a burned out shell.

[oldtimer]

Is the good right wing performance because many view Mitsotakis and ND going too far to the center?

Correct.

Mitsotakis is a liberal-lefty, he wants to make ND into a center-left party.

So ND gains from the center-left while losing an equal amount to it's right.

So until the other center-left parties move right to attract disappointed conservatives, ND will always win by a landslide. There is not enough space for 2 large center-left parties.

But a majority in Parliament will always be in question if they lose too many votes to the right.

[oldtimer]

#Kyriakoslide



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:June_2023_Greek_legislative_election_-_Municipal_Units_Results.png

It didn't beat his May record by just 2 municipalities. Anyway, almost final results, 98% counted:

40.6% ND, 158 seats
17.8% Syriza, 48
11.9% PASOK, 32
  7.7% KKE, 20
  4.7% Spartans, 12
  4.5% EL, 12
  3.7% NIKI, 10
  3.2% PE, 8
  2.5% MeRA25, 0
  3.4% Others

52.8% Turnout

It's interesting to see any large local shifts compared to last month.

The thing that pops up is that PASOK fell in most rural areas.
I guess that is because this time they did a largerly progressive campaign that was unpopular in rural areas, thus preventing them from overtaking Syriza.

[oldtimer]

It's interesting to see any large local shifts compared to last month.

The thing that pops up is that PASOK fell in most rural areas.
I guess that is because this time they did a largerly progressive campaign that was unpopular in rural areas, thus preventing them from overtaking Syriza.

Wasn't probably the low turnout? I mean, if PASOK did a more progressive campaign that would manifest itself in the more urban areas of Athens and Thessaloniki, but in reality PASOK polled badly in these areas, bellow 10% and in some districts even behind KKE.

PASOK will never gain much in Athens no matter how progressive it is, the wounds of the economic crisis are deepest in the cities and they still blame PASOK for that.

The farmers in rural areas where less affected and stuck with PASOK the most, but they hate progressives.

PASOK's strategy this time was flawed, to beat SYRIZA for 2nd place they need to win the  rural areas first, because they are blocked out in urban areas.

[oldtimer]

It's interesting to see any large local shifts compared to last month.

The thing that pops up is that PASOK fell in most rural areas.
I guess that is because this time they did a largerly progressive campaign that was unpopular in rural areas, thus preventing them from overtaking Syriza.

Wasn't probably the low turnout? I mean, if PASOK did a more progressive campaign that would manifest itself in the more urban areas of Athens and Thessaloniki, but in reality PASOK polled badly in these areas, bellow 10% and in some districts even behind KKE.

PASOK will never gain much in Athens no matter how progressive it is, the wounds of the economic crisis are deepest in the cities and they still blame PASOK for that.

The farmers in rural areas where less affected and stuck with PASOK the most, but they hate progressives.

PASOK's strategy this time was flawed, to beat SYRIZA for 2nd place they need to win the  rural areas first, because they are blocked out in urban areas.

Right. I would say that PASOK has probably time on their side. With Syriza still trapped under Tsipras and with little to show for, PASOK can "step by step" represent themselves as the alternative to ND.

I have doubts.

The total of all the right of center parties is around 54%, matching the all time high of 1974.

Before that only in 1961 and 63 elections that were not fair or free did they get a majority of the popular vote.

PASOK getting stuck in a progressive arms race with SYRIZA meant that ex-SYRIZA voters bypassed PASOK for go to ND, while ex-ND voters went even more Right.

Progressivism is uncool in Greece at the moment, the middle of the road has shifted.

I wonder what will happen in Portugal since they are very similar, those Chega numbers might not be a fluke.

[oldtimer]

I’m intrigued to see Zoe Konstantopoulou’s party with some seats. It seems pretty hard left but also nationalist. Have seen a few people stating that they had appeal outside the traditional confines of the far-left, although I would want to see some data on that.

She gets the non-communist intellectual leftist vote.

It's historically usually around 5%.

If you plot on the map the combined Konstantopoulou-Varoufakis vote share it's pretty similar to SYRIZA in the 2007-09 elections.

[oldtimer]

Varoufakis missing the threshold a second time in a row while three different far right parties and also Zoe Konstantopoulou make it... can this man ever catch a break?

Here is why in case you down want to look at past posts:

Spoiler alert! Click Show to show the content.

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Varoufakis being ejected and Konstantopoulou taking his place is natural.

The non-communist left is around 5% so there is no space for both of them in Parliament.

The crucial moment: Varoufakis took down the whole "Progressive Coalition Government" idea with his Plan Dimitra for Bank Closures, Eurozone exits and replacing them with his Crypto called Dimitra.

Since Unemployment is 10% not 25% anymore , everyone was spooked, PASOK pulled the plug on any coalition government with Varoufakis.

Since Varoufakis was needed in any Progressive Coalition, the election was over and he handed Mitsotakis his victory.

Varoufakis is one of the most hated men for what he did, on top of his clownish behavior in 2015.


As to the 3 right wing parties.

That is a surprise, the right was in decline since 2012, now they recovered to their second best result ever.

My guess is the Migrant Ship and the Murder-Rape by a Migrant that coincided, spooked people to the Right.

The government's move for a 3 day mourning was unpopular and voters saw the center left being aggressively pro-migrant, open borders stuff.

Also ND tried to play it too smart by first promoting NIKI and then the Spartans, in the hope that the conservative vote would be split evenly and all of them would get bellow 3%.

If the economic downturn continues I can easily see the Right hit about 20% combined.

In Greece like in Iberia, right wing parties were non existant until the crisis hit.

The Government in Greece unlike in Iberia, has tried to arrest and ban them for over a decade, but they always pop up due to popular demand, much like the left in the Cold War.

Now they say they will modify the electoral law again to ban them from any future election, but it's futile wack-a-mole.

ND and PASOK pundits are the ones who really run scared of them along with Economists, they still remember the popular demand for their execution in the 2011-13 riots and revolts.

[oldtimer]

Mitsotakis was sworn in as PM this morning:

https://twitter.com/ekathimerini/status/1673270838345203713

63-64 members.

It's a record size but a standard way to ensure loyalty through patronage.

It shifted some problematic ministers around (like Adonis Georgiadis) but did not eject them.

The first crisis they are facing is the Migrant one, and the second one is the collapse of the tourist sector.

Tough job but somewhat interlinked, since the murder-rape case of a Polish woman 2-3 weeks ago in a tourist island by a migrant was big news, even the Polish Government intervened.

[oldtimer]

Tsipras has resigned from Syriza's leadership:

https://twitter.com/GreeceElects/status/1674363238467657730
He will not run in the next leadership ballot.

Incredible.
Until today he said that he would run to be re-elected for the leadership unopposed, in an emergency party congress in Autumn mostly as a formality.

I guess he found out he would lose to blank ballots (there is the option to just cast a black ballot).

Another thing this morning was the intence leaks that Tsipras would propose today to dissolve SYRIZA and create a new Tsipras party with Tsipras as it's leader.

This time I don't think he had a majority within his own party for anything.

[oldtimer]

Who could be the new leaders of SYRIZA, here are some names:

1.Achtzioglou.

The most likely to get the job.
Always followed the Tsipras line.
She has a bad reputation from her Tsipras government days and is considered a lightweight.

Spoiler alert! Click Show to show the content.

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The press years ago strongly indicated that she was a girlfriend of Tsipras that helped her get the Labour Minister position.

Now she is a mother out of wedlock with SYRIZA party spokesman, Tzanakopoulos.
(what is it with greek center-left men and free love ?)

Tzanakopoulos has strongly pushed for her leadership prospects, since he has a relationship with her, clashing with Tsipras loyalists for quite some time now.

2.Hliopoulos.

SYRIZA's Athens Mayoral candidate in 2019.
A facial copy of Androulakis.
Political non-entity.

3.Sakellaridis.

SYRIZA's Athens Mayoral candidate in 2014.
Clashed with Tsipras repeatedly.
Got hit by ND for being a bit gay.
Political non-entity.

Every other leadership prospect got purged by Tsipras over the years or lost their seats.

[oldtimer]

Now with Tsipras out of the picture, what could be the future of Syriza? Could the possible contenders for the leadership "revive" the party or is this the "end" for the party's aspirations as the main alternative to ND?

I can't see any of the hopefuls reversing SYRIZA's return to 3% and protest party status. For all his faults the guy was a master manipulator and tactician, not unlike Trump, and had successfully stifled any dissent.

 

Tsipras "master manipulator and tactician" ?
The guy thought that Merkel was going to give him the Nobel Peace Prize.

A naive wannabe Stalin is a more accurate description.

There is also a further problem for SYRIZA, that 4-5% that usually voted for them before the Crash now votes for other left parties, so there is no lower limit to how far they will drop.

[oldtimer]

Now with Tsipras out of the picture, what could be the future of Syriza? Could the possible contenders for the leadership "revive" the party or is this the "end" for the party's aspirations as the main alternative to ND?

It's probably the end for the center-left for now.

Voters are clearly looking to the right for any opposition to the government, and the center-left parties seem unable to accomodate the right wing shift of the electorate.

The common theme of these two elections was fear of tax rises and fear of migrants, with a little bit of public services rotting.

SYRIZA lost almost half of it's support, yet very little went to other left or center-left parties.

[oldtimer]

I’m intrigued to see Zoe Konstantopoulou’s party with some seats. It seems pretty hard left but also nationalist. Have seen a few people stating that they had appeal outside the traditional confines of the far-left, although I would want to see some data on that.

She gets the non-communist intellectual leftist vote.

It's historically usually around 5%.

How woke is this demographic and how woke is this party?

That demographic is standard anti-globalist leftist without the window smashing.
That party is full of TV and theatre actors, hence how Konstantopoulou got a makeover from "Uber Karen" to feminine "Marianne Williamson".

[oldtimer]

Just looking at the results by locallity.

Not much deviation from what you would expect.

Voters voted mostly by class.

The upper class voted over 80% ND.
The working class leaned Left and Right, at about 45%.
Farmers leaned PASOK and towards the Right with large variations from village to village.

The "Red" villages from the civil war leaned Left, in one village they had 2% Militant Anarchists and almost 1% Marxist-Leninists.

The changes from 2007 which was the last pre-crisis election is interesting though:

Spoiler alert! Click Show to show the content.

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In Athens the centrist parties just exchanged voters among themselves from center-left to center-right.

The Center-Left overperformed in the local areas of Arta where the Tsipras family has local roots, and for some reason Rethimno.

ND overperformed in Athens and the Islands but declined sharply in the rest.

Greece minus Athens saw a huge shift to the Right, tempered only because Athens makes half the vote.

The Class division can also be seen in recent greek immigrants, Dubai residents voted over 80% ND. While German and Swedish residents, because they do working class jobs, leaned Left.

[oldtimer]

In other news post-election machinations:

News that will affect the 2027 election:

Spoiler alert! Click Show to show the content.

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The Mitsotakis Party (ND) is testing proposals to change the electoral law yet again.

The proposals include a lowering of the threshold for an automatic majority to 35% and an increase of the threshold to enter parliament to 5%, in order to maximize ND seats counts.

However increasing it to 5% might not have any difference because of the number of parties who are just bellow that, they can easily find a few thousand dissapointed ex-ND voters to cross it. And Konstantopoulou can gain a lot of ex-Varoufakis and ex-Tsipras votes.

Anyway their main obstacle will be the Communists, will they risk breaking the 1974 Pact and increase the threshold beyond the point that the Communists would risk getting ejected (4.5%) ?

About 1/3rd of those who work in the greek public sector are Communists thanks to the Pact.

In news of parliamentary proceedings:

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A bit like in Portugal all parliamentary parties have the right to elect Vice-Speakers.

Here 75 MP's are needed, all new incoming parties where blocked by the old parties from having a Vice-Speaker.

In Tsipras news:

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It's an Achtzioglou vs Charitsis race for who is going to lead SYRIZA to dissolution, Polakis (a rough tough guy from the Cretan mountains with a huge moustache) is the wild card.

That the leadership election has been moved to September works against Achtzioglou, it allows more time for less known candidates to get known.

10 SYRIZA MP's are rumoured to be leaving for PASOK to give Androulakis the position of Leader of the Opposition.

Tsipras is said that he is waiting for the defeats in the Locals and Euro elections to return next June to the SYRIZA leadership as some kind of "saviour".

In PASOK news:

Spoiler alert! Click Show to show the content.

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Ex-MP and former leadership contenter Loverdos, has left to join ND.
His base of Ekali (the most upper-class municipality in the country) voted 83% ND and less than 3% PASOK.

[oldtimer]

Proposal: I'm considering transforming this thread in a Greek politics and elections thread. There are important political events in the horizon in Greece: The changes in Syriza and its impact in the political system, local elections in the fall and the EP elections next year. Plus, other interesting info and debate regarding Greek politics.

Let me know what you think about this idea.

This definitely belongs to such a thread:

Panos Kammenos, the coalition partner of Tsipras has gone on greek national TV in a very long interview to explain how he backstabbed Tsipras and got backstabbed back, in an explosive interview also implicating America, France and Germany with details.

SYRIZA has denounced it, but Kammenos says he was secret video recordings that proves it.

Here is part of it, along with an abridged basic translation in the spolier section:

Spoiler alert! Click Show to show the content.

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The basic abridged translation is that in 2015 Tsipras and the EU had a Deal that went against the private financial interests of Kammenos (he has a large imported car dealership and preferential greek bank loans).

So Kammenos contacted the Obama Administration to sabotage the EU Deal and impose a 3rd Bailout (which in my opinion led directly to the chaos of the winter of 2015-16, Brexit, and Trump), predictably the Bailout did not do wonders for greek car sales (not that smart of a businessman).

Then in 2018 Kammenos said he was backstabbed by the Trump Administration and Germany when they made false promises to Tsipras to sign the Prespes Treaty with North Macedonia in exchange for the Nobel Peace Prize (only a fool would believe verbal promises by politicians, like Tsipras ironically).

Cherry on the top.
His allegations that the buildings used by the EU for official business are bugged, so they had to negotiate and do their machinations in a private Hotel room, with Varoufakis doing spy stuff to counter-blackmail any blackmailers.

And he alleges that the Leader of PASOK is probably a secret Turkish Agent (he has a fascination with spy stuff ever since he was an aide to Mitsotakis Snr.)

Basically confirming most of the things that circulated for years:

That politicians aren't as smart as they think, and can do stupid duplicious things from overconfidence.

Brexit and Trump all because of a Greek car dealer James Bond wannabe (the Obama people should have known better anyway)

[oldtimer]

Title of thread changed.

We have municipal and prefecture elections in October, so it will be an electoral thread again pretty soon.

I don't think there is a need, it will be a snoozefest and their power is currently very limited.

Some local "governor" races like North Aegean, Western Macedonia, or Western Greece might go for independent candidates.

The Mayorality of Athens might switch hands due to the local unpopularity of Mitsotakis's nephew who is the Mayor (he ruined the main avenue in the city center in an expensive vanity project), but the opposition has no popular candidate to rally around (story of their life).

Apart from that no change is forecast and those elections aren't really considered serious given the centralization of power.

[oldtimer]

Title of thread changed.

We have municipal and prefecture elections in October, so it will be an electoral thread again pretty soon.

I don't think there is a need, it will be a snoozefest and their power is currently very limited.

Some local "governor" races like North Aegean, Western Macedonia, or Western Greece might go for independent candidates.

The Mayorality of Athens might switch hands due to the local unpopularity of Mitsotakis's nephew who is the Mayor (he ruined the main avenue in the city center in an expensive vanity project), but the opposition has no popular candidate to rally around (story of their life).

Apart from that no change is forecast and those elections aren't really considered serious given the centralization of power.

It's still a relevant electoral event. In 2019, ND won a landslide, around 47% of the votes and Syriza polled bellow 10%. It will be interesting to see how they will perform and if PASOK is able to recover. Also, don't forget the Syriza leadership ballot.

Which main avenue in Athens had a renovation?

University Avenue (Panepistimiou) and Constitution Square (Syntagma).

He wanted to make a "Parisian Boulevard" out of them as a Social Experiment with the support of Social Scientists, instead 3 years and 13 million bucks later it's a hot mess:

https://www.kathimerini.gr/society/562504717/ateleiotos-o-megalos-peripatos/
https://www.protothema.gr/greece/article/1389437/megalos-peripatos-rave-xilone-mesa-ston-ioulio-stin-panepistimiou/

Local social scientists don't know why it's unpopular, for them it's a real mystery as it looked really great in CGI.

In practice here is what went wrong with it:

The pavements became too wide, and unshaded, and on the same level as the road, their empty and dangerous at night with all the crime.
The roads too narrow, so a constant noisy traffic jam, messed with public transport.
The climate is too hot and dry for large trees.
The buildings are Brutalist style, too ugly for tourists.
Business saw a fall in trade as it became more difficult to reach them.