Many but unnecessary votes
The first political conclusions from Sunday’s municipal and regional elections are easy: The ruling conservatives won, the main opposition, SYRIZA, lost, and socialist PASOK came out of its coma, showed signs of life, and the question is whether it can get up and run. But there are also some questions about these elections that are more difficult to answer. Especially concerning the results in the cities of Volos and Argos.
What happened in Volos is known all over Greece. Achilleas Beos, a businessman-politician with connections in the local media, who did not hesitate to slap a fellow citizen, throw water at another and swear at a few, was re-elected from the first round with a 57%. He felt so triumphant that, in his victory statement, instead of saying what he will do for his beleaguered city (which flooded during Storm Daniel and a few weeks later in Elias), he made vulgar homophobic statements about SYRIZA leader Stefanos Kasselakis, to rapturous applause by his supporters.
Kambosos and Beos did not have official support from New Democracy, but it is obvious that they did.
In Argos, incumbent mayor Dimitris Kambosos was not triumphantly re-elected on Sunday, but came out first and is heading for the runoff. He also has a long history of vulgarity as in 2018, when fascists lynched the then 75-year-old Thessaloniki mayor Yannis Boutaris, he wrote “this is the fate of TRAITORS [written in capitals] below a photo of Boutaris who had fallen on the ground. He did not stop there. He posted a video where he stated that “we annoyed Boutaris who is liked by the Jews… Boutaris can say all this because he wears the little hat [kippah]. Because we don’t wear the little hat, we can’t say these things and everyone attacks us.”
To his credit, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis expelled him from New Democracy after the second comment, but five years later he renewed his faith in a man who claims that the Italian manufacturer of Lamborghini produced an orange model to honor the oranges produced in Argos. As New Democracy stated in its announcement in July 2023, “the status of a member of New Democracy, as well as the rights and offices deriving from it, are returned to him.”
Kambosos and Beos did not have official support from New Democracy, but it is obvious that they did. Their political groupings received undivided support from the political apparatus of the conservatives. The deputy minister of climate crisis, Christos Triandopoulos, even attended Beos’ main pre-election speech.
Τhey both bring many votes but, as with the national elections, they proved unnecessary for the conservatives. So why support such carriers of vulgarity when it is certain that at the next turn the party will have to deal with what they bring?
