SYRIZA party

The contest for a new leader of the left-wing SYRIZA party has already produced realignments among the party's several factions and they are probably not over yet.

Nikos Pappas, who served as the minister of digital policy, telecommunications, and media from November 2016 to July 2019, on Saturday announced his candidacy for the leadership of the leftist SYRIZA party.

Greek officials said Friday that Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis never discussed issues that concern Greek citizens or the country's sovereign rights with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Three months ago, I made the decision to actively engage with the Greek national elections as a brief interlude between two chapters in my business career. An expat who transferred to boarding school in Massachusetts, I have now lived outside Greece for 60% of my life.

The leadership developments in the SYRIZA party are coming to a head on Saturday, when the meeting of the Central Committee will take place.

The party is beset by division and it is still reeling in the wake of two devastating defeats in a row - Mitsotakis' New Democracy party defeated SYRIZA 40.56% to 17.83% on June 25, the party.

The main opposition left-wing SYRIZA party is on a quest for a new leader who will be able to beat Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, its officials say.

The democratic vigor of politicians is tested mainly when they are facing defeat. How strongly they believe in their principles becomes evident by how they handle the popular mandate when it is against them.

The stance shown by the president of the SYRIZA party is, in this respect, a sign that he correctly interpreted the outcome of the May 21 and June 25 elections. 

The first virtue of a good novel is internal coherence. It may be built upon outrageous assumptions, such as the existence of extraterrestrials on Mars, but contradictions within the plot are not permitted. Fantastic stories, be they scientific, horror, or otherwise, are akin to non-Euclidean geometry. They begin with unfamiliar axioms but are subsequently structured with absolute logic.

The members of Greece's new government take the oath during a swearing-in ceremony attended by President Katerina Sakellaropoulou at the Presidential Palace in Athens on Tuesday. Center-right Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis' cabinet was sworn in as his New Democracy party had 40.55%, more than twice the opposition SYRIZA party's 17.84% after Sunday's election.

New Democracy leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis (C) greets supporters after the announcement of the first results in the general elections, at the party's HQ in Athens, 25 June 2023. Photo EPA-EFE/ALEXANDROS VLACHOS

"We have a strong mandate and a parliamentary majority and our government will be a government of hard work and practical results," Mitsotakis said.