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Greek main opposition party leads opinion polls after election of new leader

Xinhua, January 17, 2016 Adjust font size:

Greece's main opposition conservative New Democracy (ND) party has taken the lead over the ruling Radical Left SYRIZA party after the election of its new leader on January 10, according to the results of two opinion polls released on Saturday.

Liberal Kyriakos Mitsotakis, a former Administrative Reform Minister, won the ND party elections. He pledged to provide Greeks with a "credible alternative choice to the populism of Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras."

ND lost to SYRIZA in both general elections last year in January and September, but pollsters said that following the change of guard in the party leadership, the conservatives have a better momentum.

If elections were held Saturday, ND would win with 23.6 percent of votes versus 19.9 percent for SYRIZA, according to the survey conducted by polling firm Metron Analysis for the newspaper "Parapolitika" (Behind the scenes).

The conservatives led by Mitsotakis would garner 21.3 percent against 18 percent for SYRIZA, according to the results of the survey carried out by Alco firm for Proto Thema (Top Story) newspaper.

The third party in both opinion polls remained the far Right Golden Dawn with 4.6 percent of votes and 5.2 percent, respectively.

The results were published as the government faced a series of protests almost on a daily basis lately over its pension reform proposal, which will be put to vote in the parliament in early February, according to the updated time schedule.

Thousands of protesters took to the streets of Athens once again on Saturday, denouncing the reform during a rally called by the two main unions of private and public sector employees GSEE and ADEDY. Doctors, lawyers, farmers and various other professionals have staged demonstrations after the return from the New Year holidays and more are scheduled for coming weeks, while a first general strike has been called for February 4 by ADEDY and GSEE. Enditem