Greece begins voting in crucial election with leftists Syriza set for win

Greece has begun voting in a crucial general election that could bring the anti-austerity Syriza party to power and lead to a re-negotiation of the country’s international bailout. Syriza, led by 40-year-old Alexis Tsipras, leads the incumbent conservative New Democracy party of Prime Minister Antonis Samaras by around four points, according to pre-election opinion polls. Some 9.8 million people are eligible to vote.

We are voting for Alexis Tsipras to put an end to this misery. Enough is enough! We won’t let them destroy our children.

Stavroula Gourdourou, an unemployed mother who will vote for Syriza for the first time

Tsipras wants to renegotiate Greece’s massive £240 billion debt and end the wage cuts and public spending reductions linked to its bailout by the European Union and International Monetary Fund. The possibility of a victory for the radical left-wing party has sparked fears that Greece could default on its debt repayments and quit the group of 19 countries using the single European currency - a so-called “Grexit” - plunging the Eurozone into crisis.

World greece election