New Democracy Win Election But Not Enough For Majority Government

The incumbent centre-right New Democracy (ND) under PM Mitsotakis has won Sunday’s election, despite a series of scandals, with 40.8% of the vote based on 94.3% of ballots counted, according to Reuters. While ND is well ahead of the leftist Syriza on 20.1%, it falls short of the votes needed to form a majority government. If a coalition cannot be agreed, then there will be new elections, possibly in July when a new voting system is introduced, as noted by the Economist.

• The left of Greek politics is also unlikely to be able to form a coalition with socialist PASOK on 11.6% of the vote and the communist KKE with 7.2%. The far right Hellenic Solution has 4.5% while the other smaller parties achieved 15.9% in total. There is a 3% threshold to attain parliamentary seats.
• In terms of possible coalitions, PASOK has excluded the possibility of forming a deal with ND under PM Mitsotakis, while the PM has said that he doesn’t want to govern in a coalition, thus making new elections highly likely. During that time a caretaker PM will be appointed.
• There will be a new system of proportional representation by July that awards the party with the most votes between 20 and 50 bonus seats.