PM rolls up sleeves for regional polls
Mitsotakis says in interview that the first 100 days of his second term have felt more like 1,000
Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis will spend this week leading up to Sunday’s regional and municipal elections mostly on the stump, trying to ensure that ruling New Democracy maintains its domination of regional governments.
In an interview on TV channel Alpha Monday, Mitsotakis said he decided to get involved, mainly in the regional elections, because he thinks the 13 governors must be people with whom the government can cooperate.
“Our goal remains to win as many regions as we can, why not all 13?” he said.
As far as municipalities go, Mitsotakis noted that he has endorsed only three candidates in the biggest cities, including the incumbent mayor of Athens, his nephew Kostas Bakoyannis.
New Democracy controls 11 of the 13 regions; a dissident conservative is the incumbent in North Aegean, while New Democracy has endorsed the incumbent governor of Crete, Stavros Arnaoutakis, a socialist former lawmaker who won his third mandate in 2019 with the support of his party, PASOK, and left-wing SYRIZA. This time, SYRIZA is fielding its own candidate.
In several regions, notably the Ionian Islands, the Peloponnese and Western Macedonia, New Democracy’s quest for dominance will be challenged by conservative dissidents. And it is still unknown whether incumbent Thessaly governor Kostas Agorastos will suffer as the result of the recent devastating floods in the area. Thessaly is one of only three regions where PASOK and SYRIZA have endorsed the same party. Overall, PASOK, known for its strong roots in local government despite a precipitous drop in national election in the 2010s, has decided to test its strength against SYRIZA’s; supplanting the latter as the main opposition to New Democracy is still its goal.
For Mitsotakis, a few days on the stump will also be a respite for a series of crises he has faced since being triumphantly re-elected in June. In the TV interview, he admitted that the first 100 days of his second term have felt more like 1,000.
Asked about Thessaly’s Agorastos, Mitsotakis maintained that “he still remains a very good head of region.” But in an implicit rebuke to the regional government’s performance, he announced days ago that water management will be taken over by a new state agency.
