Four to run in ND race as Georgiadis bid accepted

Former health minister Adonis Georgiadis joined the race for the leadership of New Democracy over the weekend after the party’s electoral commission decided to accept his bid to be a candidate despite the fact that he submitted it after the deadline.

The committee had rejected Georgiadis’s bid to join the contest on Friday, after the ex-minister submitted it a few minutes after the 6 p.m. deadline. The decision prompted protests, not least from the other candidates in the race, who said it was unfair Georgiadis should be excluded after having gathered the minimum 50 signatures of support from the party’s political committee. Finally, on Saturday, the committee decided to accept Georgiadis’s bid after all. He joins three challengers: former administrative reform minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, Central Macedonia Governor Apostolos Tzitzikostas and interim party leader Evangelos Meimarakis.

As the leadership contest looms, Meimarakis told MPs over the weekend that they must avoid “naval gazing” and focus on “supporting society.” In a reference to upcoming votes on austerity measures, Meimarakis said ND’s support should not be taken for granted. ND will clash “with every policy that hits farmers and small businesses, that imposes the average and protects all the ills of old-style party politics,” he said.