The ruling conservatives say they will run in the next national election seeking a third term, based not just on their record during seven years in power but on a positive vision for 2030 and beyond.
Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis’ keynote speech on the opening day of his New Democracy party congress touched on all the key themes he wanted highlighted, plus a couple of points he wanted stressed, one of which directly addressed objections and dissent from within the party.
In that respect, Mitsotakis noted that New Democracy will continue its open doors policy toward those citizens that are not naturally conservative. In doing so he pushed aside objections from die-hard conservatives that he has positioned his party too close to the center and that he has chosen too many former socialists to be his close collaborators. In his speech, the prime minister offered no olive branch to far-right voters, themselves split among at least four parties, which may become six by the time of the next election.
Mitsotakis clearly wants to woo again the wide swath of voters, mainly centrists but also quite a few on the center-left, who massively voted for him, rather than his party, in 2019 and 2023, making his first two terms possible. In recent opinion polls, quite a few of those voters appear detached and uncommitted. That is why, despite its comfortable double-digit margins, New Democracy is far from the 39-41% share of the vote in achieved in 2019 and, twice, in 2023, allowing it to govern without a coalition partner.
