Three parties in need of shock absorbers
New Democracy celebrated its 50th anniversary with a street party, as nostalgia dedicated the need to pick up the original torch – as featured in the conservative party’s banner – to serve as a comforting reminder of its roots. Two former prime ministers were absent from the lackluster celebration on Rigillis Street – Antonis Samaras and Kostas Karamanlis – even though they had been personally invited by the prime minister. Kyriakos Mitsotakis took the high road and reached out to them, probably confident in the knowledge that the invitation would be turned down and his magnanimity – for which he is famous, after all – could expose the pettiness of his detractors. The end result was a hobbled party, as the absence of the two former party presidents demonstrated the rift in a fluttering New Democracy – and it’s a deep, incurable rift, not some small crack.
The other perennial on Greece’s political scene, PASOK celebrated its birthday by scrapping the name Movement for Change and going back to Panhellenic Socialist Movement, as well as re-embracing the bright, emerald rising sun of the original logo over its postmodern iteration. A modern restoration, one might say. PASOK’s big bash came in the form of elections for a new party president. Or “the next prime minister” according to the overly hasty rhetoric of some of the candidates in the race.
All six candidates, and especially the two who made it into the final round – incumbent Nikos Androulakis, a non-brilliant politician with obvious limitations, and Haris Doukas, who before running for Athens mayor, and winning, had coveted a seat at the main stage – must curb their enthusiasm about a “victory of the people,” which is how they have chosen to interpret the high turnout last Sunday, and ponder the following serious question: What changed so that around half of the 270,000 people who voted in the election for party president in 2021 didn’t turn up to vote again? Were they just passing by in 2021 and saw no reason to vote again, or are they demanding citizens who weren’t persuaded to participate?
SYRIZA, the third biggest party until recently, has no reason to celebrate. Fractured and canceled by the “year of Stefanos Kasselakis” as its leader, the leftist party is providing its critics and even some of its self-proclaimed friends ample opportunity to laugh at its expenses as it crashes.
ND and PASOK can still hope that desire for power may absorb some of the shocks; SYRIZA cannot.
