New Democracy leadership election, 2009

The 2009 New Democracy leadership election was held on November 29, 2009, following the announcement of the resignation of Kostas Karamanlis, after more than 12 years as leader of New Democracy, the main centre-right political party and one of the two major parties in Greece. Karamanlis announced that he would start procedures for the election of a new president on October 4, 2009, after the defeat of majority party New Democracy in the 2009 Greek legislative election, which was held in the same day. Antonis Samaras succeeded Karamanlis as the party's leader having won 50 percent of the votes.

Results

The results of the election.

Candidate	Votes	%
Antonis Samaras	386,400	50.06
Dora Bakoyannis	306,625	39.72
Panagiotis Psomiadis	78,870	10.22
Total	771,895	100.00
Valid votes	771,895	98.69
Invalid ballots	10,241	1.31
Votes cast / turnout	782,136	100.00

Background

In March 2004, New Democracy formed a cabinet for a first time under Kostas Karamanlis after their win in the 2004 Greek legislative election and received a fresh mandate for a second term in the untimely 2007 election. On September 2, 2009, Karamanlis called early general elections for a second time during his incumbency as Prime Minister of Greece, stressing the need for economic reform to tackle the impact of the global financial crisis on Greek economy. He also blamed main opposition PASOK for these early polls, accusing them of creating a protracted pre-election climate until next March when the members of the Hellenic Parliament were to vote for the election of the President of Greece, as PASOK had proclaimed their intention to vote against incumbent Karolos Papoulias in order to force the government to call early general election, in a period when opinion polls had been giving a victory for PASOK by a large margin.