Pavlos Polakis

The debate on the budget in the House of Representatives turned out to be a foretaste of the new political period ushered in by the advent of 2025, with the Syriza Progressive Alliance emerging unscathed from the vote, but from the benches of what is now the third parliamentary power in the plenary chamber.

Almost as time was running out, yesterday afternoon, the Syriza Progressive Alliance‘s stance on defence spending crystallized, with the budget debate culminating this evening.

A major disruption within the SYRIZA Progressive Alliance was triggered by the news of Eyaggelos Apostolakis’ decision to leave the party. The admiral’s move took both the party’s new chairman, Socrates Famellos, and the natural leader of SYRIZA, Alexis Tsipras, by surprise, as he announced his intentions late yesterday afternoon.

The Timeline

For leftist SYRIZA, the real challenge now lies ahead. We don't mean the likelihood of more MPs defecting from its parliamentary group or the fact that the ill-mannered Pavlos Polakis came second in Sunday's party leadership race with a stunning 43% that established him as the de facto voice of the opposition within the party.

The left-wing SYRIZA party, whose MP Sokratis Famellos was elected as it new leader Sunday, announced the election's official final results Monday, giving Famellos 49.36% of the vote.  

Socratis Famellos, MP for Thessaloniki, was elected as SYRIZA’s new leader in the first round of internal elections, securing 49.41% of the 70,152 votes cast. His victory ushers in a new chapter for the party after a prolonged period of internal division.

The new leader of SYRIZA

Sokratis Famelos, according to the biography on his website, was born in 1966 in Athens, but grew up and has lived in Thessaloniki since 1970.

Polls Open Nationwide
Today marks the first round of SYRIZA Progressive Alliance’s internal elections to choose the party’s new President. Voting is taking place in 400 polling stations across Greece.

Tonight, the internal debate within SYRIZA Progressive Alliance will take place on ERT’s frequency, as the four presidential candidates of the opposition party—Apostolos Gletsos, Pavlos Polakis, Sokratis Famellos, and Nikola Farandouris—will face off at 8 PM.

On Monday, SYRIZA is expected to approach the judiciary regarding Kaselakis‘ offshore accounts, in light of the claims made by Pavlos Polakis during the Political Secretariat’s meeting last week.