GREEK ELECTION FALLOUT:GREEK POLITICAL leaders yesterday began a flurry of exploratory talks on the formation of a new government in an exercise that looks extremely unlikely to bear fruit.
Voting on Sunday, Greeks overturned the country’s political order, stripping the two parties that dominated the country since the fall of the dictatorship in 1974 of more than half of their combined share of the vote.
As the dust settled after a night of vote counting and intense speculation, the tally showed that seven parties had crossed the parliamentary threshold. Conservative New Democracy took 108 seats; the Radical Left Coalition (Syriza) 52; socialist Pasok 41; Independent Greeks, a New Democracy splinter, 33; the Communist Party 26; the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn 21; and the Democratic Left 19.
The new parliamentary arithmetic confirmed that New Democracy and Pasok, in coalition since November, had fallen short of an overall majority in the 300-member parliament – by just two seats.
As leader of the first-past-the-post party, New Democracy’s Antonis Samaras received an exploratory mandate to form a government from the president yesterday. His subsequent one-to-one meetings with three other party leaders failed to produce one. Mr Samaras’s proposals for a coalition were flatly rejected by Alexis Tsipras, the leader of Syriza, now the country’s second-largest party.
Referring to the “barbaric measures” of the bailout memorandum, Mr Tsipras, a 37-year-old civil engineer, said: “There can be no government of national salvation because [Mr Samaras’s] signature and commitments to the loan agreement do not constitute salvation but a tragedy . . .
“Our message of our people to European leadership is clear: the Greek people last night rejected the policy of austerity, as it is being rejected by all the peoples of Europe. The time has come for it to be withdrawn.”
Mr Tsipras, who now gets the exploratory mandate, added that he would forge ahead with his own plans to form a left-wing coalition.
But as the new dispensation has made clear that a left-wing government is impossible – not only have the Communists rejected the idea but the numbers don’t add up – Mr Tsipras’s comments were seen by some as the first volley in his party’s campaign to become the first party in any new elections.
After his meeting with Mr Samaras, Pasok leader Evangelos Venizelos made a call for the country’s pro-European forces – he named New Democracy, Syriza and the Democratic Left – to form a government, which he said his party would support without demanding any seats.
But hinting that he would not accept Mr Samaras as prime minister, he said this new government would have to be led by a personality of “broad appeal”, someone who “represents the new trend expressed in the election result, a trend to try and renegotiate and reconfigure” the memorandum.
Mr Samaras also met the Democratic Left leader, who ruled out any involvement in a New Democracy–Pasok coalition. Fotis Kouvelis said he would await Syriza’s proposal. The Communist Party’s Aleka Papariga refused to meet Mr Samaras, as did the Independent Greeks party. No invite was extended to Golden Dawn.
