Leader of the Opposition (Greece)

The Leader of the Opposition (Greek: Αρχηγός της Αξιωματικής Αντιπολίτευσης) is the politician who leads the official Opposition in Greece.

For the Leader of the Opposition in other parliamentary systems, see Leader of the Opposition.
Leader of the Opposition
Αρχηγός της Αξιωματικής Αντιπολίτευσης
Incumbent
Alexis Tsipras
since 8 July 2019
Term lengthWhile leader of the largest political party not in government
Inaugural holderYannis Makriyannis
Formation16 September 1843
Greece
This article is part of a series on the
politics and government of
Greece

Role

The Leader of the Opposition is normally the leader of the largest party not within the government, which is usually the second largest political party in the Hellenic Parliament.

One exception to this rule was during the Papademos government, when Antonis Samaras, leader of the New Democracy, despite supporting the new government, retained the position of Leader of the Opposition. According to the Standing Orders of the Hellenic Parliament (Art. 20) "The President of the largest Parliamentary Group which does not participate in the Government, is called Leader of the Opposition and has special rights recognised by the Parliament's Standing Orders and current provisions". Because Samaras wanted to retain this position, no New Democracy MPs joined the Government, since if a single MP had joined the Government as a minister that would have meant that the New Democracy Parliamentary Group participated in the Government. Only non-MPs were allowed to join the Government. In fact, the new Defence Minister, Dimitris Avramopoulos, was forced to resign from his seat in order to satisfy the above provision. Despite protests form the other parties, the Parliament's Speaker decided that there was no violation of Art. 20, since no New Democracy MP participated in the Government.

Following the January 2015 legislative election, Antonis Samaras, leader of the New Democracy, became Leader of the Opposition for a second time.

Samaras resigned as chairman of New Democracy on 5 July 2015, after the overwhelming victory of the "No" vote in the Greek bailout referendum, naming Vangelis Meimarakis as transitional chairman.[1]

List of Leaders of the Opposition since 1974

Political Party:   EK–ND / EDIK   PASOK   ND   SYRIZA

Portrait Name Political Party Term of office
Georgios Mavros Centre Union – New Forces
in 1976 merged into
Union of the Democratic Centre		 197428 November 1977
Andreas Papandreou PASOK 28 November 197721 October 1981
Georgios Rallis New Democracy 21 October 1981December 1981
Evangelos Averoff New Democracy December 19811 September 1984
Konstantinos Mitsotakis New Democracy 1 September 198412 October 1989
Andreas Papandreou PASOK 12 October 198923 November 1989
None – National Unity Government 23 November 198911 April 1990
Andreas Papandreou PASOK 11 April 199013 October 1993
Miltiadis Evert New Democracy 13 October 199321 March 1997
Kostas Karamanlis New Democracy 21 March 199710 March 2004
George Papandreou PASOK 10 March 20046 October 2009
Antonis Samaras New Democracy 30 November 200920 June 2012
Alexis Tsipras SYRIZA 20 June 201226 January 2015
Antonis Samaras New Democracy 26 January 20155 July 2015
Vangelis Meimarakis New Democracy 5 July 201524 November 2015
Ioannis Plakiotakis New Democracy 24 November 201511 January 2016
Kyriakos Mitsotakis New Democracy 11 January 20168 July 2019
Alexis Tsipras SYRIZA 8 July 2019Incumbent

See also

References
  1. "Παραιτήθηκε ο Αντώνης Σαμαράς από την ηγεσία της Νέας Δημοκρατίας" (in Greek). in.gr. 5 July 2015. Retrieved 5 July 2015.
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