Reuters
October 21, 2011
Greece's embattled socialist Prime Minister George Papandreou is clinging to power after losing a deputy in the effort to impose a fresh wave of austerity on an angry public, but his grip is weakened by problems at home and abroad.
A shrinking parliament majority, street protests and lack of wider consensus are testing Papandreou's resolve, as will any failure on the EU's part to come up with a comprehensive solution to Greece's biggest post-war economic crisis.
Snap elections now would be disastrous for his ruling Socialists, who won polls two years ago on tax-and-spend pledges and found themselves unprepared to deal with the debt crisis threatening to take down the euro and derail the global economy.
"He won't call a snap election unless he has to. He'll stay on even if he loses two more deputies," said Theodore Couloumbis of the ELIAMEP think tank. "He doesn't want to be the leader who brought his party to second or even third place in one term."
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