Greek legislative election, 2004

Greek legislative election, 2004

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All 300 seats to the Hellenic Parliament 151 seats needed for a majority
First party Second party   Leader Kostas Karamanlis George Papandreou Party ND PASOK Leader since 21 March 1997 8 February 2004 Last election 125 seats, 42.74% 158 seats, 43.79% Seats won 165 117 Seat change 40 41 Popular vote 3,359,058 3,002,531 Percentage 45.4% 40.5% Swing +2.66% -3.29%   Third party Fourth party   Leader Aleka Papariga Nikos Konstantopoulos Party KKE SYRIZA Leader since 1991 1993 Last election 11 seats, 5.52% 6 seats, 3.20% Seats won 12 6 Seat change 1 0 Popular vote 436,573 241,539 Percentage 5.9% 3.3% Swing +0.38% +0.1%
Prime Minister before election Costas Simitis PASOK Subsequent Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis ND

Greek Parliamentary election, 2004

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Distribution of parliament seats after the 2004 elections (Results).
New Democracy: 165 seats   Panhellenic Socialist Movement: 117 seats   Communist Party of Greece: 12 seats   Coalition of the Radical Left: 6 seats
Date	March 7, 2004
Previous prime minister	Kostas Simitis
Next prime minister	Kostas Karamanlis

Costas Simitis
PASOK

Kostas Karamanlis
ND

Parliamentary elections were held in Greece on 7 March 2004. The New Democracy Party of Kostas Karamanlis won the elections, ending eleven years of rule by the Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK). PASOK was led into the elections by George Papandreou, who succeeded retiring Prime Minister Costas Simitis as party leader in February.

Greek politics is strongly dynastic. Kostas Karamanlis is the nephew of Konstantinos Karamanlis, who was six times (1955, 1956, 1958, 1961, 1974, 1977) Prime Minister and twice President of Greece (1980–1985, 1990–1995), and the founder of New Democracy after the restoration of democracy in 1974. George Papandreou is the son of Andreas Papandreou, three times (1981, 1985, 1993) Prime Minister and the founder of PASOK, and the grandson of Georgios Papandreou, a liberal centrist who entered national politics in the 1920s and was twice Prime Minister (1944, 1963). Athens daily Kathimerini quoted a voter during the campaign as saying: "We Greeks like to know where our leaders come from. We feel we know these families as well as we know our own."

In January New Democracy was leading PASOK in opinion polls by 7%. But Papandreou's election to the party leadership allowed PASOK to regain ground. During February Papandreou campaigned on "the need for change" in Greece, hoping to neutralise the strong sentiment for a change of government. By late February New Democracy's lead in the opinion polls had been cut to 3%.

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