Androulakis elected leader of Greece’s Movement for Change party

By Magda Panoutsopoulou

ATHENS (AA) - European Parliament lawmaker Nikos Androulakis was elected the new leader of Greece’s center-left Movement for Change (KINAL) party Sunday with 68% of the vote.

Androulakis defeated former Prime Minister George Papandreou, who received just 32% with over 90% of the votes counted so far.

Papandreou served as prime minister from 2009 to 2011 and previously as education minister and minister of foreign affairs during the governments of the Pan-Hellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK) party, which was founded by his father and former Prime Minister Andreas Papandreou.

Roughly 206,000 people voted in the latest round, down from 270,000 in round one.

The polls opened at 7:00 a.m. (0500GMT) at 840 election centers in Greece. Only those who cast their ballots in the first round were eligible to vote.

The candidates in the first round last Sunday included Pavlos Geroulanos, who served as culture and tourism minister from 2009-2012, former KINAL spokesman Pavlos Christides, former justice and interior minister Haris Kastanidis and former education minister and law professor Andreas Loverdos, who came in third with 26%.

KINAL, Greece’s third largest group in parliament, was founded as a coalition of center-left parties in 2018. The party currently comprises PASOK and the Movement of Democratic Socialists (KIDISO), which was formed in 2015 by a group of parliamentarians led by Papandreou, who broke away from PASOK.

It currently holds 22 seats and is part of the opposition in the 300-member Greek parliament.