Greek Voters Put Papandreou Back in Power

Four years after they tossed him out of office in disgrace, troubled Greek voters turned anew to Socialist warhorse Andreas Papandreou on Sunday, sweeping him back into power in an extraordinary political resurrection.

Fueled by national disquiet over economic austerity, the comeback was a personal vindication for the ailing 74-year-old autocrat, who has been the fulcrum of Greek political life for decades.

Papandreou easily outdistanced conservative Prime Minister Constantine Mitsotakis for the first time in the fourth electoral confrontation in as many years between the two old enemies.

A former UC Berkeley economics professor who, as prime minister, discomfited Greece’s North Atlantic Treaty Organization and European Community partners with radical socialist rhetoric, Papandreou will return to office with a comfortable parliamentary majority.

As raucous cavalcades of horn-tooting Papandreou supporters waving green flags careened through downtown streets early today, incomplete but definitive returns gave Papandreou’s Panhellenic Socialist Movement, known as Pasok, 46.6% of the vote and 166 seats in the 300-seat unicameral Parliament. Mitsotakis had 39.9% and 110 seats. Communists, leftists and right-wing nationalists will share the rest.

“The people have made a decision,” the bespectacled Papandreou said, looking tired as he read his victory statement without emotion from behind a desk.

“Pasok will enact economic policies that will bring stability, development and social security,” he said, appealing for unity. “Together we can regenerate the country.”

Trailing from the outset of the vote count, Mitsotakis conceded defeat five hours after the polls closed. “New Democracy took difficult but very necessary decisions for the future of Greece,” he said. “We paid the corresponding political price. I respect the judgment of the Greek people, and I wish success for the next government.”

The Papandreou victory was widely foreseen by opinion polls, which have shown him leading Mitsotakis for more than a year among voters fed up with government cost-cutting that has won hearty applause from the international community. At its most basic level, Sunday’s outcome was as much popular protest against Mitsotakis as it was enthusiasm for Papandreou.

It remains to be seen whether a new Papandreou government will mean a change of political and economic direction for Greece, or simply shifts in emphasis.

“We won this race because Mitsotakis ran the country in an authoritarian way. It is a great victory of the people and we plan to change the face of Greece,” said Pasok spokesman Costas Laliotis.

Papandreou, who lacks physical stamina, made only a handful of campaign appearances in seeking a new lease on an office he held through controversy and scandal from 1981 to 1989.

For his comeback bid, a strongly pro-European Papandreou replaced the firebrand Papandreou who first came to power promising to withdraw Greece from NATO and the EC.

In the decline before his long-shot renaissance, Papandreou endured open heart surgery in 1988, national scandal over his affair with an airline stewardess more than 30 years his junior and a divorce from his American wife of 39 years.

As he left power, he was accused of masterminding Greece’s greatest financial scandal, a $200-million bank embezzlement, and of accepting a $400,000 bribe. After a 10-month, televised trial in which the charges foundered on circumstantial evidence, Papandreou was acquitted on all counts in January, 1992.

Since then, from a villa in a wealthy suburb outside the Greek capital, Papandreou has portrayed himself as a member in good standing of the centrist club of European social democrats.

His campaign promises were short on specifics beyond promising Greeks a government that would be honest, responsive and accountable. Papandreou says he will press Greece’s union with the Europe of the EC, of which it is the poorest member.

Papandreou’s spendthrift eight years as prime minister were marked by nationalization of money-losing industries, heavy borrowing, record deficits, extensive public works and lucrative wage and pension packages.

Mitsotakis won power in 1990 promising to clean up Papandreou’s economic mess. After false starts and delays that would come back to haunt him Sunday, Mitsotakis imposed textbook austerity, freezing wages, increasing taxes and cutting government expenses.

In September, he was able to report that Greece’s inflation rate had fallen to 12.8%, the lowest rate in 20 years. But growth will only be about 1% this year, and Greek workers particularly chafe at structural reforms that have slashed living standards.