Tsipras heads for dominance of SYRIZA despite encountering obstacles
Alexis Tsipras is due to be elected the leader of a unified SYRIZA on Sunday after delegates at the party’s founding congress voted on Saturday to adopt a new charter.
Sunday’s vote will also lead to the election of the party’s 200 central committee members. A day earlier, Tsipras’s bid for the coalition to transform into a single party, behind an agreed charter and central decision-making structure was largely supported by more than 3,000 delegates at the congress.
However, opposition to the plan, which demands that SYRIZA’s factions are disbanded, met with some opposition, particularly Second World War veteran Manolis Glezos. The 90-year-old argued that SYRIZA’s strength lies in the fact that it is an amalgamation of forces and leftist voices and likened Tsipras’s demands to “slaying the horses that brought us from 3 percent of the vote to 27 percent.”
Delegates voted to allow more time for SYRIZA’s factions to decide whether they would be dissolved.
The majority of delegates also dismissed a proposal from the Aristeri Platforma (Left Platform) for the party to leave open the option of Greece returning to the drachma.
