Μake us preferred on Google Expectations were high on Saturday afternoon. The bar had been set by the government’s own spin machine, which had described the prime minister’s upcoming speech at the Thessaloniki International Fair (TIF) as visionary. Officials talked up a series of measures that would include something unexpected, a big surprise, even possibly something unprecedented, that no one else had ever thought of. None of it ever materialized.
Kyriakos Mitsotakis appeared stiff and visibly tense, both during his speech on Saturday night and during his press conference the following day. He clearly knew there was no rabbit for him to pull out of a hat.
What was at stake was rallying the troops through his presence and his words. Morale within New Democracy circles has not been at its best, and one of Mitsotakis’s main tasks was to send a message to the party’s base: a new four-year term, a third term in office in which New Democracy could govern again with an outright majority, remains within reach.
Calling himself “optimistic, ready and determined,” Mitsotakis asked voters to give him a chance at a fresh start, pledging to confront what he called the “deep state” and the entrenched problems he blames for holding Greece back.
That pitch might have landed differently if Mitsotakis were seeking a second term. He is, however, asking for a third one, and it follows a second term that was, by most accounts, worse than the first. New Democracy’s support has slipped by only around 14 percentage points since the 2023 election, a feat achieved largely thanks to the ineffectiveness of the opposition, rather than any government successes.
Mitsotakis is still betting on the public’s wariness of former Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, who now leads the newly formed Greek Left Alliance (EL.A.S). He is also betting on the broader fragmentation of Greece’s progressive camp. That landscape could shift once Greeks head to the polls, and if the country ends up holding a repeat election, as it has in the past when no government can be formed, further surprises cannot be ruled out.
The new package of measures, presented by the PM under the banner “Agreement for Progress and Prosperity,” contains measures open to competing interpretations but stops short of what is typically described in Greek political life as a genuine vision. Those who attended the fair reported little sense of enthusiasm in the hall.
Whether the speech moves public opinion will become clear once opinion polls are conducted and circulated. Few expect Mitsotakis’s appearance in Thessaloniki to significantly shift New Democracy’s starting position heading into the campaign, though it may nudge the party slightly closer to the outright majority it is chasing.
