May 6, 1959
GEORGIOS PAPANDREOU: The leader of the Liberal Democratic Party, Georgios Papandreou, in a newspaper interview ahead of his visit to Patras tomorrow, explained his reasons for forming the party. «In the six months since I have resigned as leader of the Liberals and despite all the opportunities to renew the party and to unite political forces… the situation had worsened instead of improving. Eventually, despite the introduction of the simple proportional electoral system, we were forced to form an alliance in the municipal elections to avert the complete erosion of the center,» he said. «I realized that I did not have the right to remain on the sidelines and felt it my duty to form the national democratic center… by setting up the Liberal Democratic Party, the fundamental principle of which is to rule out any cooperation with the United Democratic Left (EDA) and to defend democracy from all its enemies. My reasons for doing so were neither personal nor partisan… but purely national. I feel a great satisfaction, as the country’s response shows that it has a general understanding of the nation’s needs that also dictated the foundation of the Liberal Democratic Party.»
