By Antonis Anzoletou

After the European elections a new field of confrontation will open between the government and the opposition. THE Kyriakos Mitsotakis has pledged to bring the postal vote to the Parliament for the national elections as well. It is recalled that the majority had tried to do the same in January when the relevant regulation for the Euro elections was voted. The amendment that extended postal voting to national elections had led to the veto of the bill by SYRIZA and PASOK. Required, according to Constitution, an increased majority of 200 MPs and was the occasion to cause tensions. It was argued by both parties that the move of the Ministry of the Interior was sudden, there was no prior discussion and it essentially came to “set fire” to the good climate that had been created with the initial consensus.

With 158 “for”, 135 “against” and 6 “present”, the bill for the introduction of postal voting in European elections and national referendums was accepted. Only the coalition voted for it and this means that if the New Democracy to achieve consensus on this specific issue post-election, he will have to get the “green light” from other parliamentary forces as well. According to the arithmetic of the Plenary, she lacks 42 votes and needs the assistance of at least SYRIZA or PASOK and one or two more parties.

As everything shows, the government’s proposal will only concern expatriate Greeks. For the voters of the interior, a constitutional obstacle that is said to exist and concerns the fact that the vote within the territory cannot be carried out retroactively should be overcome. A dichotomy already exists among constitutionalists. Unless the solution is provided by the Constitutional revision given that the revision process can start in the Parliament in about a year.

It is recalled that those registered for the postal vote amounted to 202,556, of which 153,322 (75.7%) are residents of the territory and 49,234 (24.3%) Greeks living abroad. The highest number of registrations were recorded in Germany (9,578), the United Kingdom (9,090), the USA (3,857), Belgium (3,491), the Netherlands (3,119) and Cyprus (2,808). The Ministry of the Interior is optimistic that the vast majority of those who applied to vote by mail will exercise their right to vote.