Greece’s main left-wing opposition party Syriza suffered a crushing defeat on Thursday when nine lawmakers quit the party in protest at its new leadership.
Miami businessman Stefanos Kasselakis, 35, won the leadership in late September in a contest organised along the lines of primaries. But he has so far failed to stem the decline in popularity of the party, which suffered a crushing defeat in June’s general election.
Since then, the Syriza party has slipped to third place in opinion polls behind its Socialist opponents. This has reinforced the dominance of the conservative government of Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.
On Thursday, former Syriza Labour Minister Effie Anchtsioglou led the exit from the party as nine lawmakers declared themselves independent. They joined former finance minister Euclid Tsakalotos and another colleague who quit the party on 11 November, reducing the number of seats won by Syriza in the elections from 47 to 36 in the 300-seat parliament.
Critics of the new leader describe him as unable to build political consensus in a historically fractured party and intolerant of dissent.
Under the leadership of former Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, Syriza transformed itself from a small political organisation to a ruling party during the previous decade’s massive financial crisis that brought Greece to the brink of bankruptcy.
Tsipras, who was in power from 2015 to 2019, opposed the tough policies imposed by international bailout lenders, but lost his popularity among voters as the country emerged from recession. He announced his resignation after a third consecutive general election defeat.
