Athens, July 4 (BV) – A member of Greece’s main left-wing opposition party SYRIZA has resigned both from the party and from parliament to support former Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and his newly established political movement, signaling growing momentum behind the former leader’s political comeback.
SYRIZA lawmaker Giorgos Karameros announced on Saturday that he was leaving the party and surrendering his parliamentary mandate in order to support Tsipras’ newly formed Greek Left Alliance (ELAS).
Karameros informed SYRIZA president Sokratis Famellos of his decision before publicly declaring his support for Tsipras’ initiative, describing the new political formation as offering “a perspective for Greece.”
“I will remain on this front line from now on, but as an active citizen, a simple soldier in the necessary victorious progressive alliance of social democracy, the left and political ecology,” Karameros said in a statement.
The resignation marks another setback for SYRIZA, which has struggled to recover politically since losing power and following Tsipras’ departure from the party leadership in 2023.
Karameros, who was first elected to parliament in 2023, said he had supported Tsipras’ political initiative from the beginning and believed the creation of ELAS could unite Greece’s fragmented progressive forces.
The move comes just one day after former SYRIZA spokesperson Kostas Zachariadis also resigned from the party to support Tsipras, suggesting that additional defections could follow in the coming weeks.
Tsipras, who served as Greece’s prime minister from 2015 to 2019 and led SYRIZA until 2023, has insisted that current lawmakers wishing to join his new party must first relinquish their parliamentary seats, a condition aimed at reinforcing the movement’s image as a fresh political start rather than a parliamentary split.
Political analysts view the latest resignations as an indication that Tsipras’ new project could significantly reshape the Greek center-left and left-wing political landscape ahead of future elections.
The emergence of the Greek Left Alliance opens a new phase of political competition within Greece’s progressive camp, while raising fresh questions about the future viability of SYRIZA as the country’s main left-wing political force.