Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said he would seek a re-election to secure his victory without the need for a coalition partner.
Mitsotakis’ “New Democratic” party won the election, but without enough parliamentary seats to form a government, beating its main rival, the left-wing SYRIZA party, by about 20 percentage points, with almost 90% of the vote, but due to the current proportional electoral system. representation. His 40 percent share of the vote will not be enough to win a majority of 300 parliamentary seats, meaning he will either have to find a coalition partner from a smaller party or run for a second election.
“Starting tomorrow, I will follow all constitutional procedures, but I remain of my firm opinion that proportional representation calculations are like horse trading and lead to a dead end,” Mitsotakis said.
“Without a doubt, the political earthquake that occurred today calls on all of us to speed up the process of reaching a final state decision so that our country will be on its head with an experienced hand as soon as possible,” he added.
A new vote is likely to take place in late June or early July with a new electoral law that gives additional seats to the winning party, making it easier for it to form a government on its own.
Sunday’s elections are the first in Greece since its economy was no longer under the tight control of international creditors who saved Athens from the country’s nearly decade-long financial crisis.
Tsipras, 48, served as prime minister during the worst years of the crisis and has struggled to regain the broad support he enjoyed when he came to power in 2015, promising to reverse bailout austerity measures.
Source: AB