Greece's conservative New Democracy party has regained an opinion poll lead that would allow the formation of a pro-bailout government committed to keeping the country in the euro zone, a batch of new surveys showed on today.
Greece was forced to call repeat elections for June 17th after a May 6th vote left parliament divided evenly between groups of parties that support and oppose the austerity conditions attached to a €130 billion bailout agreed with the European Union and International Monetary Fund in March.
Polls up to today had showed pro- and anti-bailout parties running neck-and-neck ahead of the vote, which could determine the country's future in the single currency.
But the five new polls published in the country's weekend press showed New Democracy, which supports the bailout, gaining a lead of between 0.5 and 5.7 points over the anti-bailout leftist Syriza party.
Syriza has said it would ditch the country's bailout deal, that has led to record unemployment and severe wage cuts.
But the country's lenders such as Germany have warned that if the country took such a step, they would cut its funding. That would lead to a chaotic bankruptcy and possibly force the country to leave the euro.
New Democracy would get between 25.6 per cent and 27.7 per cent of the vote if the election was held today, according to the polls by Eleftheros Typos/Pulse, Proto Thema/Alco, Real News/MRB, To Vima/Kapa and Ethnos/MARC.
Syriza was in a range of 20.1 and 26 per cent.
According to the Pulse and MARC polls, New Democracy and the next-biggest pro-bailout party, the Socialist Pasok, would win combined a parliamentary majority of between 11 and 16 seats in the country's 300-seat parliament.