PM campaigns for candidates facing stiff competition
Four days before the October 8 regional and local elections, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis continued to campaign Wednesday on behalf of candidates his New Democracy party has endorsed, focusing on those facing the likelihood of competitive runoffs on October 15.
Mitsotakis focused on northern Greece Wednesday, going to the city of Kozani to campaign with incumbent governor of Western Macedonia Giorgos Kasapidis, whose main opponent, as in the previous election, in 2019, is a dissident conservative.
In 2019, Kasapidis had won in the first round. But recent polls show that a runoff is more likely this time, even after a change in the electoral law that allows the first-place candidates to win outright if they get 43% of the vote.
New Democracy is endorsing candidate governors from its ranks, except on Crete, where it has chosen to back socialist incumbent Stavros Arnaoutakis, the heavy favorite to win a fourth term. In municipalities, it has only endorsed the incumbents of the three largest cities – Athens, Thessaloniki and Piraeus.
In Kozani, Mitsotakis repeated his rationale for turning the regional elections into a partisan contest. The government, he said, wants to have in the crucial governors’ posts people with whom it can cooperate, especially where development projects are concerned. He noted that the government succeeded in getting considerable funds from the European Union, especially the Recovery and Resilience Fund that will disburse several billion euros in the coming years.
“It is of very great importance to spend these resources in cooperation and in lockstep with the central government. And that is what Giorgos Kasapidis’ re-election ensures,” Mitsotakis said.
The PM’s next destination was Thessaloniki, Greece’s second largest city, where incumbent Konstantinos Zervas faces a competitive contest.
“Thessaloniki has been grappling with chronic difficulties and defective infrastructure, but is changing at great speed,” Mitsotakis said.
There seem to be no difficulties in the most populous region, Attica, where former minister Nikos Hardalias could win outright in the first round.
