Greece | Syriza headed for victory in election, exit poll shows

Alexis Tsipras looked set to return to power in Greece as his Syriza party headed for an election victory for the second time in eight months, an exit poll showed.
The 41-year-old former prime minister’s Coalition of the Radical Left was leading with as much as 34 percent of the vote compared with as much as 32.5 percent for New Democracy, headed by Evangelos Meimarakis, 61, according to the survey broadcast by the main Greek television channels. The far-right Golden Dawn was in third place with between 6.5 and 8 percent.
Whichever party emerges victorious, what follows is a period of negotiations with smaller groups before the makeup of the next government becomes clear. Unlike in the January vote that swept Syriza to power on a promise to abandon austerity and defy European leaders, the new coalition has little room to maneuver after Tsipras caved to the demands of creditors for more spending cuts and tax increases in exchange for aid.
An international review of Greece’s reform efforts is due before the end of the year, and a positive verdict will be necessary to start accessing the country’s new 86 billion-euro (USD97 billion) bailout, its third rescue package since 2010. Of particular importance will be the disbursement of funds to recapitalize Greek banks, which have been battered by outflows of deposits that prompted capital controls.
The vote was Greece’s sixth national ballot since 2009, including July’s surprise referendum on austerity measures called by Tsipras as he upped the stakes in talks with the euro region.
Both Syriza and New Democracy said in the campaign that they would not challenge the bailout agreement and would push to implement its terms, though a number of smaller parties didn’t share that view. Investors have nonetheless signaled confidence in recent weeks that the worst is over for Greece, with government bonds posting the biggest returns in the euro zone over the past month, and the Athens stock market also rallying.
In the exit poll, Syriza was projected to take between 30 and 34 percent of the vote, while New Democracy’s range was 28.5 to 32.5 percent. Center-left Pasok, which governed in a coalition with New Democracy until January, was set for 5.5 to 7 percent. Independent Greeks, the junior coalition partner in Tsipras’s last government, was forecast to take between 3 and 4 percent, exceeding the threshold to enter parliament. Bloomberg