News archive of March 2019

Mansur Yavaş, the candidate of the main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) and İYİ (Good) Party, has emerged as the winner of the March 31 local elections in Ankara, becoming the capital city's new mayor, with nearly two percentage points ahead of his rival, according to unofficial figures.

With an eye on upcoming local and European Parliament elections, along with the looming national elections, the Greek government is reportedly intent on distributing handouts and benefits to the tune of 658 million euros in a bid to bridge the gap in opinion polls with opposition New Democracy.

Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras reacted strongly to a move by the Albanian government of Edi Rama to effectively expropriate large tracts of prime seaside properties owned by members of the Greek minority in the upscale coastline town of Himara and neighbouring Sarande.

The main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) has swept to landslide victories in coastal Aegean and Mediterranean provinces.

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has said the preliminary results of the March 31 local elections showed that his ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) became the winner of the municipal elections "by a majority just like when our party came to power on Nov. 3, 2002."

It is always useful to refer back to old newspapers and realize either how different, how similar or even how timely things that were written years ago still are. I was reading an article by Kathimerini founder Georgios Vlachos, written on February 23, 1947. Different times, different conditions and threats.

PAOK edged ever closer to its first league crown since 1985 with its win at Xanthi on Sunday, while Olympiakos came from behind to beat Atromitos at home.

The Thessaloniki giant is four games away from an unbeaten title, after seeing off Xanthi 2-1, goals coming from Sergio Oliveira and Pedro Enrique. Dinis Almeida pulled one back for the Thrace club.

We do not need the government to complete its four-year mandate in order to reach any conclusions regarding the policies it has implemented: Data confirm that taxes and levies have decimated the Greek middle class - driving a good part of it into the black economy - and led to the shrinking of business activity.

With the European Parliament elections rapidly approaching, the discussions of the so-called systemic representatives who intervene in the mass media are heating up.

Middle-class women can provide the solution to Greece's acute demographic problem if they are offered the right support by the state, said Dionysis Balourdos, research director at the National Center for Social Research (EKKE).