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Greek elections: The ones who decide are the “undecided”

The climate is extremely heavy for Greeks in the European Union and the worst case scenarios have already been foreseen. Thus, on January 25th the ones who have not decided yet which party to support will actually determine the future of the country.

By: Athanase Papandropoulos - Posted: Monday, January 12, 2015

“The elections on 25 January are considered to be more crucial than the ones in June 2012”, according to high EU official, who also believes that the EU is tired of paying for Greece.
“The elections on 25 January are considered to be more crucial than the ones in June 2012”, according to high EU official, who also believes that the EU is tired of paying for Greece.

by Athanase Papandropoulos  


“The elections on 25 January are considered to be more crucial than the ones in June 2012”, according to high EU official, who also believes that the EU is tired of paying for Greece. 

A voluntary exit therefore from the EU, would not be a surprise. “Currently Greece owes 270 billion euro to EU citizens, some of which are poorer than Greeks […] 

Thus, why should these citizens feel disturbed in case of a Grexit from the Eurozone and maybe from the EU as a whole? 

Maybe because they will lose their money?”. Are they sure that they will get the money back? Who knows in sixty years time", he wondered. 

The climate is extremely heavy for Greeks in the European Union and the worst case scenarios have already been foreseen. Thus, on January 25th the ones who have not decided yet which party to support will actually determine the future of the country. 

If centre-right New Democracy gets the first position or in coalition with The Potami (S&D affiliated but not official member), will continue the efforts and in one year the 5-year sacrifices will begin to have concrete results. 

Many say they definitely wish to avoid a scenario where Sryiza will assure the first position. Do they want to bring about a disaster? Probably not. 

They just take seriously into consideration the populist rhetoric of Mr. Alexis Tsipras and of the “partisans” who support him. 

And let's not forget that part of these “partisans” has led us to the current deadlock. 

Moreover PM Antonis Samaras and his close aides, including Dim. Stamatis and Ch. Lazaridis, calmly watch the polls and they do not think that the electoral battle is lost. 

They also insist that the result will be decided by the undecided, with a 70% of them believing that the country should remain in a pro-European path because the future of Greece lies in the EU. 

"Anything can happen" insist circles of the Greek PM particularly referring to the increased clustering of ND (about 80%), while they simultaneously argue that the goal is the complete absorption of LAOS of George Karatzaferis, the political neutralization of ANEL and the massive blow against extreme-right Golden Dawn, adopting a tough "law and order" right-wing agenda. 

The latter was shown by the statements of Mr. Samaras a few days ago, next to the fence built in Evros to deter illegal immigrants from entering the country. 

The main objective is to “repatriate” the majority of right-wing voters who voted in the EU elections for LAOS (2.7%), for Independent Greeks (3.46%) and for the Golden Dawn (9.4%). 

As recent polls show, a substantial repatriation has been noted by this pool of voters, which in total is close to one million. 

As Aris Ravanos wrote in To Vima Sunday Edition, this repatriation is gradual, but mainly from the right side of ND. 

For example, ND receives 20% of the voters who voted for Golden Dawn, 9.2% of those who voted for ANEL, 7.8% of those who voted for PASOK, 14.4% of those who voted in favor of The River and 1.6% of those who voted for SYRIZA. 

Also, ND officials argue that the part of voters who did not want snap elections will punish SYRIZA and parties who did not vote for Stavros Dimas as Greece’s President. 

In addition PM’s office insists on promoting the popularity of Antonis Samaras and his higher eligibility as Prime Minister, according to polls, compared to Alexis Tsipras. 

But these two elements are not enough underline in private discussions high officials and they doubt whether they can reverse the negative climate against ND. 

A climate, however, which remains unclear since the coalition government-and ND in particular- never attempted to speak the truth. 

In this sense, by not being aware of the truth, also ND view about a post-election catastrophe [in case of Syriza victory] is canceled and stops being believable. 

In this context, the Greek PM decided to set aside the risks deriving from a Syriza victory and instead, focus on the program of his party -as, for example, reducing ENFIA (a “shocking” for many property tax) in 2015, guaranteeing the non-reduction of salaries and pensions, reduction to 32% of tax rates, from 42% today, and reducing corporate income tax rates. 

These proposals were mentioned during the presentation of ND’s growth plan for the next day of the Greek economy, while the main argument of the Prime Minister is that if his party wins the election, the evaluation with troika will be completed, something which will bring the end of the bailout and a great debate on the public debt will start. 

This is why the main ND’s slogan in the coming days, under the second phase of the election campaign, will be "we speak the truth, we guarantee the future" while running the first TV spots as well. 

It is crystal clear that the election outcome remains open and it’s the first time where the undecided voters will determine to such extend the final results.

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