ATHENS – Main opposition SYRIZA leader Stefanos Kasselakis has outlined his reasons for taking over the party’s leadership in 2023, but his critiques of the ruling New Democracy have provoked a strong response.

This comes amid internal turmoil as Dr. Othonas Iliopoulos, an oncologist at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston who left his post to become a SYRIZA deputy, resigned to return to the U.S. His resignation was intended to open a spot in Parliament for Kasselakis, who is not currently a Member of Parliament.

“I hope that my resignation will not deny my compatriots abroad their ability to be represented,” Iliopoulos stated, explaining that he was stepping aside in favor of the elected SYRIZA President, Stefanos Kasselakis, who was also on the party’s overseas Greek ticket. He emphasized that his decision reflects the will of thousands of SYRIZA voters abroad who want their ‘voice’ in the Greek Parliament to be one of their own. Iliopoulos will remain a member of SYRIZA-PA’s Central Committee.

However, the Parliament President’s office clarified to the Athens-Macedonian News Agency (ANA) that Iliopoulos’ seat must go to the runner-up on SYRIZA’s state deputy ticket, Popi Tsapanidou, and not to Kasselakis.

Kasselakis has been vocal in his criticism of the Mitsotakis government, prompting a sharp rebuttal from government spokesperson Pavlos Marinakis, who outlined the achievements of New Democracy since it came to power in mid-2018.

“It was with great pleasure that we saw Mr. Kasselakis take a brief break from his vacation to make another post reminiscent of the ‘good old’ SYRIZA days of denunciation and populist rhetoric, without specific counter-proposals—indeed, the hard-core version of 2012-2015,” said Marinakis.

Marinakis pointed out that New Democracy has raised the minimum wage twice—something SYRIZA did not achieve—now up to €830 ($907), with plans to raise it further to €950 ($1,038) by 2027. He also highlighted higher public sector salaries for the first time in 12 years, faster pension payments, support for new mothers, and a €10 billion ($10.93 billion) safety net for households and businesses during the energy crisis.

He added that unemployment has fallen to 9.6 percent, more than 50 taxes and contributions have been cut, and the tax-free allowance for families with children has been increased.

Tough Economic Realities

However, Marinakis did not address the continued Value Added Tax (VAT) of up to 24 percent on many essential food items, which has made them unaffordable for many households, despite supermarket prices starting to stabilize after significant increases.

“It is clear that much more needs to be done to further increase citizens’ disposable income, and we are moving in that direction. But the last thing the country needs is to return to the days when ‘wizard’s apprentices’ promised everything to everyone while pointing fingers…” he said.

Kasselakis—a Greek-American businessman—has been working to elevate the former ruling leftist party since winning the leadership, following former chief and one-time premier Alexis Tsipras’ resignation after being soundly defeated twice by Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.

In an article for the news site Documento, Kasselakis reflected on the period between June 18 and August 29, 2023, when he announced his decision to run for leadership. He noted that Tsipras had told him it would be difficult but would “surely make a boring process more interesting.”

He described Tsipras as “warm and polite” with all prospective candidates and hinted at the later deterioration of their relationship, promising to discuss it in a follow-up article “because the people of SYRIZA have a right to know the reasons.”

Kasselakis also recounted his interactions with party members during that time and how his television appearances increased in August, as networks struggled to find SYRIZA officials for their panels and began inviting him instead. This led to a “mini-movement” on social media, with a “tsunami of likes and comments” encouraging him to stand as a candidate when he shared his political proposals on Facebook.

“I felt it was the right time,” said Kasselakis, who is openly gay and expressed concern about losing privacy for himself and his partner, American nurse Tyler McBeth, whom he later married in the United States.

Kasselakis promised to continue writing articles revealing “comfortable and uncomfortable” truths, noting that after winning the leadership, he experienced “a year of being steadily undermined in a peculiar ‘Game of Thrones’ I never believed I would face.”

“Truth is like water: it always finds a way, creates cracks, and comes out. Whatever happens, water never stops,” he concluded, leaving open questions about how he was undermined and by whom.