The election of the President of the Republic is always a challenge for a Prime Minister. The upcoming presidential election, constitutionally disconnected from the threat of early elections, would theoretically be as easy to navigate as a walk in the garden of the Presidential Palace. The situation, however, has turned it into a turning point for the Mitsotakis administration.
The person he nominates for the top post will be neutral, in fact he will carry a heavy political burden as he signals the direction he plans to take. Kyriakos Mitsotakis until the end of his second term and the possibility of government collaborations.
Most of the ministers are convinced that the Prime Minister’s admission of seeking a third election is not pretentious. They believe that K. Mitsotakis wants another term in Maximos Palace. The question is whether he can do it, because even though the ND is ahead of the opposition parties by a comfortable margin, the stakes have changed.
The change in the political scene
The Center now has another contender. The PASOK after the renewal of its mandate Nikos Androulakis in the presidency he raises his percentage and gradually reduces the difference from the ND. Over the years, a significant part of the PASoK base, as shown by the qualitative data of public opinion surveys, had moved towards the Center and was one of the reference points of the Prime Minister when he took initiatives that crossed the boundaries of his own party.
If the percentage of PaSoK continues to increase, with the two presidential candidates who expressed this trend the most, the Anna Diamantopoulou and him Pavlos Gerulanoto assume important roles and the Harry Doukas to attempt to act as a pole for the most left-wing voters, a condition will be formed that the Prime Minister will not be able to ignore, especially if the president of the PASOK rushes to propose a President of center-left origins.
PaSoK, with the serious and civilized way it organized its internal elections, brought back to the fore the characteristics of the party in power that had faded during the financial crisis and claims the leading role in the Center-Left. It remains to get rid of the stigma of the memorandum, which has not been erased from the memory of the voters and K. Mitsotakis made sure to remind it in the recent debate in the Parliament saying that “History will write that the country went bankrupt during your days”.
To be precise, the country “exploded” in the hands of PaSoK, but went bankrupt within days Costas Karamanlisand this is also not prepared to be forgotten by more citizens than K. Mitsotakis estimates, if it is assumed that he is trying to split the bloc of the two former Antonis Samaras and Costas Karamanlis.
The views of the two former prime ministers
The Prime Minister opened a front with Ant. Samara was surprised by the floor of the Parliament. It seems that what he said in Cyprus about calm waters that can hide huge storms bothered him more than the government spokesman let on Pavlos Marinakiswho as a rule does not comment on the opinions of former prime ministers, although this time he raised the question “when were national concessions made by the government?”. It is most likely that the Prime Minister wanted to put an end to the interventions and the climate created by the distancing of the two former parties, who, as they believe in the Maximos Palace, injure the faction and produce legitimizing discourse for the populist parties beyond the ND Right.
Messrs. Samaras and Karamanlis may have distanced themselves from the ND of Kyriakos Mitsotakis and appear as a political duo, but they have a fundamental difference. The former is deeply pro-Western, while the latter, at least as it appeared in his two major speeches at the Concert Hall in 2022 and at the War Museum in July 2024, stands against the West, the EU and the US, criticizing them on various issues, from Immigration to dealing with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the situation in the Middle East. As far as Greek-Turkish relations are concerned, he considers it unthinkable to co-promise to appeal to The Hague because it would endanger territorial waters and sovereignty, and he believes that Turkey has a clear revision plan, which is a threat to Greece and Cyprus.
Patriotism and conflict
Due to his temperament, Ant. Samaras airs his views more often because, say those who know him well, he sees himself as the ideological leader of the wider Right, while K. Karamanlis speaks rarely and in protected settings, but is a tougher player with appeal to the “popular Right ” and to traditional audiences. K. Mitsotakis is aware of this and according to government officials, it is less likely that he unfolded some cooperative strategy of the taciturn Karamanlis and more that he got the reaction for what Samaras implied by referring to the risk of “shrinking Greece”.
However, his reference to patriotism for the second time was not at all spontaneous, after the characterization of “lentil patriots” that he addressed to those who accuse his government of neglecting the Greek-Turkish and Cypriot issues. “I do not advertise myself as a patriot, nor do I display my patriotism as a credential in my political speech” he stated and used Samuel Johnson’s phrase “patriotism is the last refuge of scoundrels”. These characterizations were disliked on the one hand because they seemed exaggerated and on the other hand because they polarize an audience that ND wants to keep close to it. The Prime Minister’s decision, according to his colleagues, is not to leave unanswered what is said in public, especially on national issues.
Government and party officials do not hide their concern about the tension in the ND Parliamentary Group. The “massage” to the MPs did not work as expected, the dissatisfaction is maintained, and apart from some middle managers, some believe that even MPs, who if the ND percentage drops below 30% know they will not be elected, are flirting with the Voice of Reason. That’s why the attacks on the right will not stop to reduce the “misled voters”.
Presidential election and reshuffle
In this climate, some are thinking about her re-election scenario Katerina Sakellaropouloualthough they know that there will be a backlash from MPs who oppose the marriage of same-sex couples, who are around 30. And other names are heard for the Presidency of the Republic, but because it is still early and the Prime Minister has banned any relevant mention, they are mainly behind-the-scenes rumours.
On the contrary, the prospect of a radical reshuffle after the presidential election, which will also touch the Maximos Palace, whose dysfunction is a daily topic of discussion among ministers, is believed to rally the MPs in the next difficult votes starting with the budget.
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