Antonis Samaras spoke to supporters in Thessaloniki yesterday ahead of Sunday’s vote for the New Democracy leadership. Following a change of the party’s constitution earlier this month, all ND members, including those that sign up on the day of the election, will be able to cast their ballots for one of the three candidates.

New Democracy leadership hopeful Antonis Samaras has stepped up his attack on rival Dora Bakoyannis, accusing her of being one of those responsible for the party’s crushing election defeat last month.

Speaking in Thessaloniki yesterday ahead of the leadership election this Sunday, Samaras departed from his previous policy of refraining from making personal attacks on Bakoyannis.

Samaras suggested that his rival had been one of the “captains of defeat” for New Democracy, having served in the government since 2007 and not being one of those who advised then Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis not to call early elections.

The former culture minister also questioned Bakoyannis’s stance on the Macedonia name issue and negotiations over reunification on Cyprus.

“Who do you want to be leader of the opposition when PASOK is in government?” Samaras asked supporters. “Who do you want to prevent a change of policy that would lead us to move back beyond the red lines set at [the 2008 NATO summit in] Bucharest?” he said in reference to Greece vetoing the entry of the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) into the alliance.

The Bakoyannis camp strenuously denied that she had been one of the ministers who advised Karamanlis to call snap elections. Her advisers said that the ex-foreign minister had advised against the move but did not speak out publicly, as she did not want to undermine the party’s position.

The same sources suggested that Samaras is being more outspoken because opinion polls are now showing that he is trailing Bakoyannis.

A Public Issue survey last Sunday indicated that Samaras was ahead of Bakoyannis.