ATHENS – The embattled leader of the fading SYRIZA-Progressive Alliance – American Stefanos Kasselakis – said he wants the party to rebrand itself with a new name and has offered the Coalition of the Contemporary Left.

That will be put up at a coming party Congress where he could face a challenge to his leadership although one of the main rebels, lawmaker Pavlos Polakis, was brought back into the parliamentary group after being ejected for insulting an aide to Health Minister Adonis Georgiadis.

Kasselakis has a full plate of trouble, with a survey finding the major opposition has fallen into third behind the equally beleaguered PASOK, whose leader Nikos Androulakis also is being challenged for the helm.

A group of SYRIZA dissidents also walked out of the parliamentary group and Kasselakis then booted lawmaker Athina Linou for allegedly not revealing her ties to a medical non-governmental organization.

But that came on a complaint from the provocative Polakis who had been ejected after she complained about his boorish behavior, which is more than the norm for the Cretan – who even objected to being readmitted without being notified.

With SYRIZA and PASOK in disarray, Prime Minister and New Democracy leader Kyriakos Mitsotakis essentially has the field to himself, even while he’s losing popularity over high food prices and a series of scandals and alleged cover-ups.

Kasselakis’ name proposal – in Greek – includes the term Synapismos but the party has further shifted away from the Radical Left SYRIZA by which it was known while ruling from 2015-19 before being ousted by New Democracy, and again in 2023.

That led to party leader Alexis Tsipras stepping aside and Kasselakis – who had failed to win a seat in Parliament – using social media in a whirlwind campaign to come out of nowhere to take leadership.

But he has moved it more toward the center – critics said toward the center-right – and that has disaffected long-time party veterans, some of whom left to form their own party, The New Left, and continued grumbling in the ranks.

Kasselakis also will reportedly propose that SYRIZA Members of Parliament not be allowed to sit on party bodies, except a national council that he wants to replace the central committee, said Kathimerini.

The report said he also wants to limit lawmakers to three terms in Parliament and if they want to seek a fourth it would have to be in a new constituency, potentially requiring them to look for votes where they don’t live or move.

Speaking to local media in Volos ahead of the meeting, Kasselakis stated that the party’s central committee set to gather  “has authorized itself … to proceed with a proposal for constitutional changes at the upcoming congress.”

“I’m not going to deviate from our purpose, which is to build a state-of-the-art party that gives voice and the dominant power to party members,” he added, although many in the party don’t like the voice he’s brought or his tone.

“I believe that I have the mandate from the (party) basis to proceed with the radical changes that the party needs,” although that means no longer including the word radical in the name.

While that was going on, the firebrand Polakis – who had supported Kasselakis even during rebellions but then moved to demanding the leader be replaced – was upset that Kasselakis let him back into the parliamentary group without consulting him.

“I don’t think I am some child to be expelled without notice and to be reinstated with a notice from (group leader) Nikos Pappas a minute before [the announcement],” he told journalists outside Parliament.

“As I stated on the day of the unacceptable expulsion, I was, am and [always] will be SYRIZA. I had also stated that only the people can expel someone and no one else … my formal return to the parliamentary group does not change in any way the political assessment I have made in relation to the political problem that SYRIZA has,” he added.