Dueling campaign rallies were held on Thursday evening, with Alexis Tsipras choosing the working-class west Athens district of Egaleo and Evangelos Meimarakis speaking from Hania, on Crete,
The two front-runners in the snap elections for Sept. 20, as polls and pundits agree, each lobbed campaign slogans and “sound-bite” like phrase for supporters and reporters.
The 40-ish Tsipras repeated the slogan “we’re doing away with the old and winning tomorrow”, speaking in an election district that solidly backed his radical leftists in the last election.
However, the presence of roughly 500 people at the rally was judged as disappointing.
Meimarakis continued his tour of Crete, from which he hails, where at one point he ridiculed the fact that elections take place in Greece at such frequency, adding that the emphasis was to restore stability.

Meimarakis dismissed Tsipras’ repeated statement of engaging in “tough negotiations” with creditors for seven months, saying that the former PM merely wasted time.
Moreover, he noted that post-election cooperation and “concessions” to would-be coalition partners will be necessary to govern the country.

SYRIZA annoyance with poll results

Meanwhile, SYRIZA leadership is reportedly annoyed by recent opinion polls showing the conservative New Democracy (ND) party slightly ahead. At SYRIZA’s central Athens headquarters, predictions put the ruling party ahead. There is doubt concerning the figures that have come to light.

Top party officials charged that the polls cannot possibly have an accurate bearing, given that a large number of citizens have yet to return from vacations. The same sources point to the Jan. 25 elections, when some polls placed SYRIZA slightly behind ND and other barely ahead. Opinion polls were woefully off target in predicting the result of the July 6 referendum.

Party officials, however, agree that SYRIZA needs to get its act together and unify its various factions after a recent high-profile split.

The party’s new slogan will be “Winning Tomorrow” as former prime minister Alexis Tsipras continues to slog out his campaign.