By Penelope Galliou

A new landscape, reminiscent of other times, when bipartisanship “flourished” and polarization was characteristic not only of politicians but also among their voters, is reminiscent recently of the bipartisan rivalry that revived between SW and PASOK.

The re-emergence to the leadership of Charilaou Trikoupis is a little bit Nikos Androulakis and his dynamic opposition “come back”, the fragmentation of the left and the removal of SYRIZA from the institutional role of official opposition, paved the way for the revival of the polarization that characterized the two parties decades ago.

The “parenthesis of political culture” imposed by the difficult period of the crisis, with the co-government of the two major parties at the time, and the subsequent “sedimentation” of PASOK, had shifted the “target” of both Piraeus and Charilaou Trikoupis in other directions and to other emerging political rivals. However, the new circumstances again change the data and respectively the attitude of the two parties, with different goals, but with a clear intention of both sides to “name” their political opponent and rally their political audience.

The results of the opinion polls also contribute to this climate, which seem to have consolidated PASOK in second place with an increasing percentage and with a big “breath” from the third party. In the new Pulse poll for SKAI, in the voting intention of the entire sample, it showed that the ND maintains its dominance with a percentage of 24%. PASOK-KINAL comes in second place with a percentage of 14%, while KKE comes third with a percentage of 7.5%. “Battle” for the fourth place is given by SYRIZA-PS and Hellenic Solution, which gather the same percentage of 6.5%, while based on the measurement, the new party of Stefanos Kasselakis, Democracy Movement, seems to enter the Parliament with a percentage of 4%, as well as the Voice of Reason of Aphrodite Latinopoulou. This is followed by Freedom Sailing with a percentage of 3.5% and Victory with 3%. MERA25 collects 2.5% and New Left 2%. Only 1.5% are gathered by the Spartans. The undecided reach 15%.

Under the new political conditions that are taking shape and shortly before his much-discussed meeting takes place Kyriakou Mitsotakis with Nikos Androulakis, next Wednesday, December 4, the fights between ND and PASOK officials have become almost the order of the day, focusing on the major issues that concern Greek society, from the accuracy and the reduction or not of the VAT, to health or labor. A climate that does not seem, however, to affect the meeting of the two leaders, nor to seek any kind of “truce” until then. After all, the conflicting atmosphere that is being created probably serves both sides, given that PASOK wants to appear as the alternative pole to the ND and the government for its part has recognized PASOK as its main opponent again. Both Mr. Mitsotakis and Androulakis have reason to signal that they are the two “gladiators” in the political scene, in order on the one hand the first, to rally the electoral base of the ND which showed a “distancing” or tendency towards the right of the ND and the second to confirm with political positions and opposition movements that he is the only one who can stand in opposition and contrasted in terms of governability with the government.

Regarding the agenda of the debate, the Maximos Palace rushed through his representative Pavlos Marinakis to characterize the meeting as “institutional”, clarifying that there is no specific agenda, nor were any conditions set. On the other hand, of course, on the side of Harilaou Trikoupi, it is leaked that Mr. Androulakis will put on the carpet all the serious issues that concern the country such as the economy, accuracy, housing, health, while in the same frame he will put national and international geopolitical developments, the functioning of institutions and the rule of law, restoring in this way to the table and the subject of follow-ups.

In any case, the plan of the two opponents is expected to unfold in its entirety and in front of the television cameras, during the budget debate in the Parliament, which is expected to seal this “new era” of the old bipartisanship.