ND leader hints at alliance during speech at Potami congress
New Democracy leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis issued a call for unity among key opposition parties on Saturday as he told the audience at centrist Potami’s congress that “we are on the same side.”
Mitsotakis was the main opposition politician to speak at the congress on Saturday, although the lineup also included PASOK’s Fofi Gennimata and former socialist prime ministers Costas Simitis and George Papandreou. The conservative chief struck a conciliatory tone in his speech, which was also critical of the current government.
“We are all together in the big reformist wave that has to change Greek society,” he told the audience in Athens. “We are on the same side of the table also when it comes to the European path for reforms.”
New Democracy spokesman Giorgos Koumoutsakos said afterwards that Mitsotakis’s appeal to Potami members and MPs was not aimed at convincing them to switch their allegiances but to establish the basis for cooperation between the parties.
At the congress, Mitsotakis, Gennimata and Potami chief Stavros Theodorakis agreed they would adopt a common position in the meeting of party leaders that Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras is expected to call in the coming days to discuss the refugee crisis.
They also agreed to put pressure on Tsipras to propose the meeting soon and not just before a European Union-Turkey summit planned for March 7.
Potami’s congress was due to end on Sunday evening with a ballot of members that would determine whether Theodorakis remains as party leader.
