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All 300 seats in the Hellenic Parliament 151 seats needed for a majority | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Parliamentary elections were held in Greece on Sunday, 18 October 1981. [1] [2] PASOK, led by Andreas Papandreou, faced New Democracy, led by Georgios Rallis. Papandreou achieved a landslide and PASOK formed the first socialist government in the history of Greece (in 1963 Centrists had formed a government under the leadership of George Papandreou, Andreas' father, but their party, Center Union, was not a socialist party but a centrist, social-liberal one).
Observers had expected a PASOK victory but were surprised by the size of the victory. [2]
185 of the 300 seats were won by PASOK or the Communist Party: both openly eurosceptic. This was the high point of Greek euroscepticism, coming just months after the country's accession to the European Communities. [3]
Party | Votes | % | Seats | +/– | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
PASOK | 2,726,309 | 48.07 | 172 | +79 | |
New Democracy | 2,034,496 | 35.88 | 115 | –56 | |
Communist Party of Greece | 620,302 | 10.94 | 13 | +2 | |
Progressive Party | 95,799 | 1.69 | 0 | New | |
Communist Party of Greece (Interior) | 76,404 | 1.35 | 0 | New | |
KODISO–KAE | 40,126 | 0.71 | 0 | New | |
Union of the Democratic Centre | 22,763 | 0.40 | 0 | –16 | |
Liberal Party | 20,645 | 0.36 | 0 | New | |
Christian Democracy | 8,638 | 0.15 | 0 | New | |
For a Revolutionary Left | 6,595 | 0.12 | 0 | New | |
EKKE – M-L KKE | 4,700 | 0.08 | 0 | 0 | |
International Workers' Union – Trotskyists | 1,646 | 0.03 | 0 | 0 | |
Democratic Social Party | 1,100 | 0.02 | 0 | New | |
Byzantine National Organisation | 407 | 0.01 | 0 | New | |
Olympic Democracy | 95 | 0.00 | 0 | 0 | |
Hellenic Universal Olympic Democracy | 5 | 0.00 | 0 | New | |
National Refugee Party of Greece "Kimon" | 2 | 0.00 | 0 | New | |
Independents | 11,025 | 0.19 | 0 | 0 | |
Total | 5,671,057 | 100.00 | 300 | 0 | |
Valid votes | 5,671,057 | 98.57 | |||
Invalid/blank votes | 82,421 | 1.43 | |||
Total votes | 5,753,478 | 100.00 | |||
Registered voters/turnout | 7,059,778 | 81.50 | |||
Source: Nohlen & Stöver |
Papandreou's new government introduced several interesting reforms in the wake of its victory (legalization of civil wedding, new family law, nationalization of certain private companies, etc.).
The main opposition party, New Democracy, faced serious internal conflicts. Georgios Rallis was forced to resign after the defeat and he was succeeded by Evangelos Averoff, former minister under Karamanlis governments. In 1984 Averof resigned because of health problems and Konstantinos Mitsotakis became the new leader of New Democracy. Noteworthy, Mitsotakis and Papandreou were both centrists before 1967 and they belonged to the same party, George Papandreou's Center Union. Nevertheless, they were strong opponents and they never liked each other. Papandreou was calling Mitsotakis "a defector, an apostate", because in 1965 he defected from the ruling Center Union and participated in a new government pleasing to Constantine II, who had just accepted George Papandreou's resignation after a serious disagreement between the King and the prime minister.
Andreas Georgiou Papandreou was a Greek economist, politician, and a dominant figure in Greek politics, known for founding the political party The Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK), which he led from 1974 to 1996. He served three terms as the 3rd and 8th prime minister in the Third Hellenic Republic. His father, Georgios Papandreou, and his son, George Papandreou, have served as prime ministers of Greece.
The Panhellenic Socialist Movement, known mostly by its acronym PASOK, is a social-democratic political party in Greece. Until 2012 it was one of the two major parties in the country, along with New Democracy, its main political rival. After a decade of poor electoral outcomes, PASOK has retained its position as one of the main Greek political parties and is currently the second largest party in the Greek Parliament.
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Georgios Ioannou Rallis, anglicised to George Rallis, was a Greek conservative politician and Prime Minister of Greece from 1980 to 1981.
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