2019 Greek legislative election

2019 Greek legislative election

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All 300 seats in the Hellenic Parliament 151 seats needed for a majority
Opinion polls
Registered	9,962,261
Turnout	57.91%
First party Second party Third party   Leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis Alexis Tsipras Fofi Gennimata Party ND Syriza KINAL Leader since 11 January 2016 9 February 2008 14 June 2015 Leader's seat Achaea Last election 28.09%, 75 seats 35.46%, 145 seats 6.28%, 17 seats Seats won 158 86 22 Seat change 83 59 5 Popular vote 2,251,426 1,781,180 457,527 Percentage 39.85% 31.53% 8.10% Swing 11.76 pp 3.93 pp 1.72 pp   Fourth party Fifth party Sixth party   Leader Dimitris Koutsoumpas Kyriakos Velopoulos Yanis Varoufakis Party KKE EL MeRA25 Leader since 14 April 2013 28 June 2016 8 March 2018 Leader's seat Larissa Thessaloniki A Last election 5.55%, 15 seats – – Seats won 15 10 9 Seat change 0 New New Popular vote 299,595 208,806 194,233 Percentage 5.30% 3.70% 3.44% Swing 0.25 pp New New
Map of electoral districts, showing the largest party by share of votes. Blue indicates New Democracy was the largest, and Pink indicates SYRIZA was the largest. Darker shades indicate stronger vote share.
Prime Minister before election Alexis Tsipras Coalition of the Radical Left Prime Minister after election Kyriakos Mitsotakis ND

The 2019 Greek legislative election was held on 7 July 2019.^[1][2] All 300 seats in the Hellenic Parliament were contested.

Preliminary results showed that the centre-right liberal conservative New Democracy party, led by Kyriakos Mitsotakis, won 158 seats, an outright majority that is more than double the party's previous representation. The party took nearly 40% of the popular vote.

This was the first national election in Greece and third election overall since the voting age was lowered to 17, and the number of parliamentary constituencies was increased from 56 to 59. Athens B, the largest constituency before the 2018 reform, with 44 seats, was broken up into smaller constituencies, the largest of which has 18 seats.

On 26 May 2019, following his defeat in the 2019 European Parliament election in Greece and the concurrent local elections, Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras announced that a snap election would be held as soon as possible following the second round of the 2019 municipal elections.^[3]

Electoral system[]

A visual representation of the seat allocation system used in Greece

Compulsory voting was in force for the elections, with voter registration being automatic.^[4] However, none of the legally existing penalties or sanctions have ever been enforced.^[5]

A number of changes to the electoral system were introduced following the September 2015 elections. The voting age was reduced from 18 to 17 in July 2016,^[6] with the same law also abolishing the majority bonus system, which gave a 50-seat bonus to the largest party. Instead, all 300 seats would be awarded proportionally.^[6] However, this law did not come into effect for the 2019 elections, as it was not approved with the required supermajority despite the Syriza-led government expressing support for its introduction for the 2019 elections.^[7] As a result, the previous system remained in force, with 250 seats elected in multi-member constituencies using a 3% electoral threshold, plus 50 bonus seats for the largest party.

The number of parliamentary constituencies was also modified in December 2018, with Athens B split into Athens B1 (North), , and , while Attica was split into and .^[8]

Opinion polls[]

Local regression trend line of poll results from 20 September 2015 to 7 July 2019, with each line corresponding to a political party.

Conduct[]

A few minutes before the polls closed, a group of young protesters stormed the 33-d polling station in the distinct of Exarcheia in Athens and stole the ballot box. Subsequently, a previously unknown anarchist group called 'Ballot-seeking Arsonists' claimed responsibility. The group claimed that they burned the stolen ballot box. As a result, a repeat election at the same polling station was held a week later, on Sunday, 14 July.^[9][10] The results did not change the final allocation of seats due to the small volume of votes.

Results[]

Results, showing the seats won by each party in each electoral district.

Party		Votes	%	Seats	+/–
	New Democracy	2,251,426	39.85	158	+83
	Syriza	1,781,180	31.53	86	–59
	Movement for Change	457,527	8.10	22	+5
	Communist Party of Greece	299,595	5.30	15	0
	Greek Solution	208,806	3.70	10	New
	MeRA25	194,233	3.44	9	New
	Golden Dawn	165,711	2.93	0	–18
	Course of Freedom	82,673	1.46	0	New
	Union of Centrists	70,161	1.24	0	–9
	Recreate Greece	41,647	0.74	0	0
	EPAM–AKKEL	28,269	0.50	0	0
	Antarsya	23,191	0.41	0	0
	Popular Unity	15,930	0.28	0	0
	Greek Assembly	14,173	0.25	0	0
	Communist Party of Greece (Marxist–Leninist)	7,778	0.14	0	0
	Marxist–Leninist Communist Party of Greece	2,791	0.05	0	0
	Workers Revolutionary Party	1,993	0.04	0	0
	Organisation of Internationalist Communists of Greece	1,675	0.03	0	0
	Syn...Fonia Politikon Kommaton	96	0.00	0	0
	Independents	472	0.01	0	0
Invalid/blank votes		120,172	–	–	–
Total		5,769,542	100	300	0
Registered voters/turnout		9,962,261	57.91	–	–
Source: Ministry of the Interior

References[]