Greek Conservatives Elect Kyriakos Mitsotakis as its New Leader To Challenge PM Alexis Tsipras Sunday January 10,2016

 

Greek conservatives elected Kyriakos Mitsotakis as their new leader on Sunday January 10,2016, hoping he can revive their fortunes and challenge leftist Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, still popular despite opting for austerity.

The conservative New Democracy party seeks to recover from its heavy election defeat in September, when Greeks re-elected Tsipras' Syriza party amid capital controls on bank deposits and a harsh third bailout with the country's foreign lenders.

Kyriakis Mitsotakis, a 47-year reformist lawmaker and scion of one of Greece's most influential political families, is expected to pile pressure on 41-year-old Tsipras ahead of a crucial parliamentary vote on pension reform, as part of the first review of Greece's bailout programme.

Kyriakis Mitsotakis ran second to Vangelis Meimarakis in the first round of the party leadership election on Dec. 20,2015 contested by four candidates, and was ahead in Sunday's runoff with 51 percent of the vote with most of the vote counted.

 Meimarakis, a 62-year-old former speaker of parliament, acted as the ND's interim chief from July to November after former PM and party leader Antonis Samaras stepped down. He won 39.8% of the vote in the first round. Mitsotakis, 47 and son of former ND leader and prime minister Constantine Mitsotakis, received 28.5% of the vote in Dec 2015
"United, we move ahead to the creative rejuvenation and expansion (of the party), so that New Democracy becomes the big centre-right party ... that will provide a reliable alternative for the country's governance," Kyriakis Mitsotakis said when victory was clear.