Bakoyianni enjoys vast poll lead
Conservative New Democracy’s candidate, Dora Bakoyianni, will easily win the mayoralty of Athens in next month’s municipal and prefectural elections, according to a poll published yesterday. A survey carried out between September 9-18 by Opinion pollsters on behalf of the Sunday Eleftherotypia found that over twice as many Athenians support Bakoyianni than the socialist PASOK candidate, Christos Papoutsis. Some 39.8 percent said they would vote for the 48-year-old MP and shadow defense and foreign minister, compared to 19.8 percent for Papoutsis, 49, a PASOK MP and former merchant marine minister who was Greece’s European Union Commissioner from 1995-1999. Populist DIKKI candidate Yiannis Dimaras came third at 8.2 percent, followed by the Communists’ Spyros Halvatzis (3.3 percent) and Synaspismos Left Coalition’s Fotis Kouvelis (2.9 percent). Some 14.8 percent said they were «not at all» interested in the October 13 elections, and 22.5 percent, «little.» PASOK’s Fofi Yennimata tops the polls among candidate prefects of Athens and Piraeus.
