Greek leftist Tsipras returns in unexpectedly clear election win

Greek leftist Alexis Tsipras stormed back into office with an unexpectedly decisive election victory on Sunday, claiming a clear mandate to steer Greece’s battered economy to recovery. The vote ensured Europe’s most outspoken leftist leader would remain Greece’s dominant political figure, despite having been abandoned by party radicals last month after he caved in to demands for austerity to win a bailout from the euro zone. In a victory speech to cheering crowds in a central Athens square, he promised a new phase of stability in a country that has held five general elections in six years, saying his mandate would now see him through a full term.

Today in Europe, Greece and the Greek people are synonymous with resistance and dignity. This struggle will be continued together for a full four years.

Alexis Tsipras

Tsipras’s first task after forming a government will be to persuade European Union lenders that enough agreed steps have been made to ensure the next payment. The bailout program is due for a review next month. He will also need to grapple with Greece’s central role in Europe’s refugee crisis, as the main entry point for tens of thousands of migrants who arrive by sea and trek up the Balkan peninsula to richer EU countries further north. In a near repeat of January’s general election, his Syriza party fell just shy of an outright majority but will form a coalition with his former partners, the small rightwing Independent Greeks party. With 99.5 percent of votes counted, Syriza had claimed 35.5 percent of the vote, easily seeing off the main conservative challengers New Democracy on 28.1 percent.

After years of almost unprecedented crisis, the vast majority of Greeks are endorsing parties that are promising to keep the country in the euro even if that implies thorough and painful reforms.

Holger Schmieding, chief economist at Germany’s Berenberg bank.

Politics Greece Tsipras