Opposition MP’s to Enforce Early Elections in Greece? Hardly…

 Kammenos – Tsipras

Posted by keeptalkinggreece in Politics

In times of financial crisis and economic instability, disaster scenarios are easy to be fed. After Independent Greek leader proposed SYRIZA to jointly have their MPs resign and force early elections I saw some post on international websites, preferably German,  speaking of early elections in Greece. “Austerity package failed, Greek opposition to enforce early elections” heralded in joy these websites. To increase the argumentation they added the fact that Samaras expelled from his party parliamentary group one MP, who had said that he won’t vote in favor of the austerity package. 

Facts are:

1. Right-populist party Independent Greeks leader Panos Kammenos on Sunday suggested that SYRIZA and Independent Greeks MPs should resign ahead of a vote on the austerity measures in Parliament and trigger snap elections.

Independent Greeks, a right-wing populist party, control 20 seats in Parliament after winning 7.5 percent of the vote in the June general election. Left-wing SYRIZA, which is Greece’s main opposition party, has 71 deputies.

According to parliamentary rules, 60 or more MPs have to resign and their replacements refuse to take their positions before Parliament can be dissolved and new elections held. (ekathimerini)

2. SYRIZA rejected Kammenos’ proposal n Monday with the argument that snap polls will take place only for the seats of the resigned MPs but that the government will continue to exist. (Imerisia) 

Speaking to NewsIt, Professor for Constitutional Law Kostas Chrysogonos commented on Kammenos’s proposal:

“The proposal is a mockery, because the other [government] parties are not obliged to follow the elections call. Elections would take place only in regions where the resigned MPs were elected. Nobody can force the other parties to follow.”

3. Also Golden Dawn (Chrysi Avgi) had recently threaten to have its 18 MPs resigned in order to force snap polls in several regions.

4. On Sunday evening PM Antonis Samaras expelled from ND parliamentary group MP Nikos Stavrogiannis for telling a newspaper that he would not back the austerity measures in parliament. Samaras’ reaction was prompt in order to send a clear measure to other MPs of ND considering to down vote the measures.

5. There are rumors from time to time speaking of some 12 MPs from coalition government parties ND-PASOK-DEMLEFT unwilling to support the measures. As the three parties have a total of 179*seats in Parliament, it looks that the austerity package is hardly at risk of not be adopted. It needs the absolute majority of 151 votes.

6. Furthermore, no opposition party in general and SYRIZA in particular sees itself as strong enough to win any elections for the time being.

UPDATE:

179*

Democratic Left MP Yiannis Micheloyiannakis resigned from the party and will be independent MP.

As for Stavroyiannis, he may be expelled from ND parliamentary group, however he may decide to keep his seat as indepentent. If he chooses otherwise, he can give back his seat to ND that will replace him with another MP.