Greek crisis: Syriza party's far-left faction breaks away to form new party
The move comes a day after the prime minister Alexis Tsipras, accused of betraying his party, announced his resignation
A group of Greek lawmakers opposed to the country’s bailout programme abandoned the governing party, Syriza, as Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras moved to force an early election to shore up his position.
The lawmakers, whose names were read out on Friday by a deputy parliament speaker on television from Athens, will be called "Popular Unity" and led by former Energy Minister Panagiotis Lafazanis, the group said.
Tsipras’s call for snap elections was expected and is welcome as it will achieve a "clearer structure" in the Greek government, Thomas Wieser, the Austrian who leads the European officials who prepare meetings of euro-zone finance ministers, told radio Oe1 in an interview on Friday.
While the move may slow Greek reform in the short term, "what’s more important is how a new government, which many people expect to be led by Alexis Tsipras again, will execute the reform programme," Wieser said.
Elected in January on an anti-austerity platform, Tsipras faced a revolt from within in his own party after pushing through the kind of tax increases and spending curbs that he had vociferously opposed while in opposition.
Though his eight months at the helm of Europe’s most-indebted country were beset by turmoil and brought the economy to the brink of ruin, Tsipras used a televised address on Thursday to list his achievements, from clinching a new aid package to securing a commitment from euro-zone partners to consider debt relief.
Tsipras remains popular with Greek voters, who gave Syriza 33.6 per cent support, a 15.8 percentage-point lead over the main opposition New Democracy party, in a July 25 poll by Metron Analysis. Polls haven’t yet given an indication of how much support Popular Unity would siphon off.
With the support of smaller pro-European Union parties such as To Potami and Pasok, the election winner "could create a strong coalition that will be able to pass and implement reforms," said analysts at Axia Ventures Group Ltd. in Athens led by Constantinos Zouzoulas.
Earlier on Friday, Greece’s President Prokopis Pavlopoulos invited New Democracy leader Evangelos Meimarakis to try to form a government, part of the constitutional procedure set in motion by Tsipras’s resignation.
While Meimarakis and Lafazanis’s 25-strong rebel group, the third-largest in the 300-seat parliament, both get three days to try to form a governing coalition, neither is likely to succeed and the process will probably culminate in elections on September 20.
