New Democracy’s central electoral committee announced its decision to postpone the elections for the party’s new leader, after technical issues caused the process to be delayed. It was reported that the decision was unanimous.
The technical issues were first noticed on Saturday night, while the committee was testing the electronic voting system. Subsequently, the elections could not start at the scheduled time of 7am on Sunday, November 22. Furthermore, another issue arose very late on Saturday night, causing the committee to replace 50 electoral delegates.
Shortly before 9:30 am on Sunday, Vangelis Meimarakis, New Democracy’s current president requested that the committee postpone the process. In fact, he warned that if his request was not accepted, he would withdraw his candidacy.
“We owe a big apology to all the New Democracy supporters, and also to all Greek citizens. Unfortunately the election process can no longer take place today. This is no time to be seeking who is responsible. The time for that will come later,” said Kyriakos Mitsotakis, one of the candidates. He also called for shadow education minister Marietta Giannakou to take over as interim leader of the party until the elections take place.
Another candidate, Adonis Georgiadis referred to the failure as a “fiasco” and asked for the resignation of all members of the electoral committee. “This is not an image that honors New Democracy,” he added.
