Prime Minister Antonis Samaras made a last-ditch plea to avoid national elections in the case that his candidate Stavros Dimas is not elected as president in the third round of voting at noon on Monday. He used his interview on public broadcaster NERIT to tell MPs that they will be held accountable towards Greek people if they don’t vote for Mr. Dimas. Parties were quick to respond to Mr. Samaras’ statements.

The main opposition Radical Left Coalition (SYRIZA) said that Mr. Samaras resorted to more “scaremongering” and “opportunism”. “The democratic world is speechless, watching him respond to (Administration Minister) Kyriakos Mitsotakis and others of his deputies who have declared they will vote ‘present’ if (fascist) Golden Dawn votes elect Stavros Dimas,” said the SYRIZA party in a statement. The party also attacked Samaras for keeping silent on the bribery allegations of Independent Greeks (ANEL) deputy Petros Haikalis.

“We want to stress that until yesterday he kept saying that elections are an uncertainty, but today he admits that elections put an end to uncertainty,” and this is the only point on which the party agrees with Mr. Samaras. “The people will put an end to the uncertainty the policy of servitude to memorandums create, and will put an end to the uncertainty that Mr. Samaras’ fixation on ruling creates,” it concluded.

In a brief announcement, the ANEL party said that “too much grief creates delusion,” while Democratic Left (DIMAR), a former ruling coalition member, said “scare-mongering harms Greece” and added that DIMAR will not vote for the Greek president proposed by the government. “The greatest danger for society and the economy is the policies that irrevocably injured social cohesion and maintained recessionary asphyxia,” it said.

The Communist Party of Greece (KKE) was critical of both the government and opposition’s statements of coming to an agreement with the EU as this would “entrap the people in the same one-way streets of the EU capital and long-term memorandums.”

To Potami party said it was disappointing to hear Mr. Samaras as he did little to change the country’s impasse. “Unfortunately, Mr. Samaras appeared in the opposition’s role in today’s opposition,” said the party, stating that this was another reason “to end once and for all with a frayed system.”