Exit polls give conservative opposition leader Greek election win

Exit polls in Greece’s general election indicate conservative opposition leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis has won a comfortable victory over left-wing Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras.

The exit polls from Sunday’s election predicted Mr Mitsotakis’s New Democracy party would win enough seats in Greece’s 300-member parliament to form a government without needing to enter a coalition with another party.

The vote is Greece’s first parliamentary election since the country emerged from three successive international bailouts and as it continues to struggle from a crippling financial crisis of nearly a decade.

The election was held three months earlier than originally planned after Mr Tsipras saw his support erode during European elections.

And it comes as the country gradually emerges from a brutal nearly decade-long financial crisis that saw unemployment and poverty levels skyrocket, and Greece’s economy slashed by a quarter.

Greece was dependent for survival until last summer on international bailouts, and had to impose deep reforms, including massive spending cuts and tax hikes, to qualify for the rescue loans.

Mr Tsipras led his small Coalition of the Radical Left, or Syriza, party to victory in 2015 elections on promises to repeal the austerity measures of Greece’s first two bailouts.

But after months of tumultuous negotiations with the country’s international creditors that saw Greece nearly crash out of the European Union’s joint currency, he was forced to change tack, signing up to a third bailout and imposing the accompanying spending cuts and tax hikes.

He also cemented a deal with neighbouring North Macedonia under which that country changed its name from Macedonia. Although praised by Western allies, the deal angered many Greeks, who consider use of the term harbours expansionist aims on the Greek province of the same name.

Mr Mitsotakis, son of a former prime minister and brother of a former foreign minister, was pledging to make Greece more business-friendly, attract foreign investment, modernise the country’s notorious bureaucracy and cut taxes.