By Yannis Anifantis

With a large majority of 176 votes, the bill for equality in the civil marriage of same-sex couples passed the Parliament. The bill, as expected, was supported by a total of 5 parties (ND, SYRIZA, PASOK, NEW LEFT, PLESI ELEFTHERIAS) with 4 of them registering losses, sometimes smaller and sometimes larger, during the roll-call vote.

From the government seats, 107 MPs voted in favor of the bill, with the differences finally reaching 51. A total of 20 MPs voted against and 31 chose to abstain. Among the latter are the 4 government officials, Minister Makis Voridis – and three deputy ministers G. Bougas, St. Keletsis and M. Kefala.

Finally, the official opposition party also recorded losses, with Pavlos Polakis and Othona Iliopoulos abstaining from the vote and Nina Kasimati, despite being “present” in the Plenary, remains “present” in the voting as well. In PASOK, any hopes for a single-digit number of abstentions were not successful, with Harilaou Trikoupi recording 11 abstentions, while 21 MPs voted in favor of the bill.

Both minority MPs of the New Left were absent, while the KO of Plefsis Eleftherias unanimously voted in favor.

On the other hand, KKE, Hellenic Solution, Spartans, Niki, together with 3 independent MPs (Katsivardas, Floros, Papaioannou) voted against. The independent member of parliament, from Pleussi, Michalis Hourdakis, declared “present”.

The climate in Parliament

In the last two days, however, the atmosphere inside the parliament was different, with members of the LGBTI+ community watching the meeting from the gallery and the Minister of State, Akis Skertsos, being with them for the announcement of the results, a few minutes before midnight .

The approval of the civil marriage of same-sex couples was welcomed by prolonged applause, both by the deputies in the plenary session, where the prime minister remained until the announcement, but also in the café of the parliament, where members of the LGBTI+ community awaited the result. In fact, even workers in the coffee shop commented that the last two days, and especially on Thursday afternoon, the Parliament had more people than during the budget discussion.

However, the intense interest was not always accompanied by applause, as during the speech of Antonis Samaras, tension was caused in the gallery between a member of the LGBTI+ community and another visitor due to the sarcastic comments made by the former about his placement former prime minister. In order to defuse the tension, the police guard had to intervene and sit between them until the tones calmed down.

The 20 “no’s” of the ND

1. Charalambos Athanasiou

2. Fotini Arabatzi

3. Vassilis Yogiakas

4. Stefanos Gikas

5. Konstantinos Giulekas

6. Thanasis Davakis

7. Tasos Dimoshakis

8. Kostas Karagounis

9. Anna Karamanlis

10. Theodoros Karaoglou

11. Andreas Katsaniotis

12. Dimitris Kyriazidis

13. Theofilos Leontaridis

14. Xenophon Baraliakos

15. Yiannis Paschalidis

16. Marios Salmas

17. Antonis Samaras

18. Euripides Stylianides

19. Maximos Charakopoulos

20. Miltos Chrysomallis

The 31 abstinences of the ND

1. Dionysis Aktypis

2. Giannis Andrianos

3. Lakis Vasiliadis

4. Kostas Vlasis

5. George Vlachos

6. Makis Voridis

7. George Georgantas

8. Yiannis Yatsios

9. Andreas Zambilis

10. Thanasis Kavvadas

11. Giannis Kallianos

12. Dimitris Kalogeropoulos

13. Markos Kafouros

14. Stavros Keletsis

15. Maria Kefala

16. Manos Konsolas

17. George Kotronias

18. Dimitris Kouvelas

19. Spyros Kulkudinas

20. Yiannis Lampropoulos

21. Pericles Mantas

22. Notis Mitarakis

23. Katerina Monogyou

24. Giannis Bougas

25. Christos Boukoros

26. Giannis Oikonomou

27. George Papasotiriou

28. Stelios Petsas

29. Thanos Pleuris

30. Christodoulos Stefanadis

31. Angelos Syrigos

The 11 abstentions of PASOK

1. Odysseus Konstantinopoulos

2. Evangelia Liakoulis

3. Stavros Michaelidis

4. Burhan Baran

5. Anastasios Nikolaidis

6. Apostolos Panas

7. Panagiotis Paraskevaidis

8. Andreas Poulas

9. Christina Starakas

10. Manolis Chnaris

11. Katerina Kazani

The two abstentions and one present of SYRIZA

Abstaining: Othon Iliopoulos, Pavlos Polakis – Present: Nina Kasimati

The two abstentions of the New Left

1. Hussein Zeibek

2. Ferhat Ozgur