Greek expatriates can now elect three members of the Greek Parliament with their own ballot in a new electoral district designed for expatriates only.
After the success of the postal voting model in the European Parliament election in June 2024, the Greek government has decided to expand the model to the national election.
The Ministry of the Interior is working on an extensive plan of changes regarding the participation of Greeks living and working abroad in the parliamentary election. The main goal is to substantially facilitate the exercise of the right to vote to Greek expatriates.
The government estimates that the current system, despite improvements of recent years, continues to keep a large part of expatriates away from the ballot box, mainly due to practical difficulties, and is therefore promoting a series of changes.
A comprehensive reform of the expatriate vote facilitation will be submitted to Parliament within the first half of 2026. The central axis of the new framework will be the establishment of postal voting exclusively for Greeks living abroad.
An exclusive ballot for Greek expatriates
The major change is that Greeks living abroad will not vote on the Greek State ballot, as was the case until today, but will have their own ballot with candidates from all over the world and will choose not only a party, but also, ticking a cross, their MP of choice.
The “Greeks abroad ballot” will be common. That is, a U.S. resident will be able to choose a candidate from Australia, Europe, or any part of the world, sending their parliament member to the Greek House.
Today, representation of Greeks abroad exists, but, as mentioned above, it is done automatically through the State, where there must be a Greek expatriate on the ballot.
However, the party chose the MP and not the expatriate voter. Now the Greek living abroad will have the choice to choose whomever they want, as the new regulation provides. The aim is that the new regulation will mobilize Hellenism abroad and strengthen the ties of the Greek diaspora with the homeland, since they can send their person of choice directly to the Greek Parliament.
The State ballot
The plan to implement it foresees the use of the State deputies’ tool, so that the three Greek expatriates are elected from the 300 Parliament MPs, as intervention in another electoral district would change the proportion of representation of the country’s populations, which is unconstitutional.
In order for the regulation to be implemented from the next election, however, a majority of 200 MPs is required. If it does not pass immediately, then it will take effect from the following election. Regardless of the 200 votes needed for the amendment to pass, there is another obstacle that may appear.
Now, the expatriates will not be represented through the parties’ State MPs. The government believes that the opposition, and especially PASOK and SYRIZA, which have long-standing bases of Greek expatriates, will have a hard time to justify their refusal – if they refuse – to the ballot of the expatriate Greeks, as it will be like refusing representation in the Greeks abroad.
The reduction in State MPs, however, will hurt the smaller parties the most, which are likely to react more strongly. For example, if New Democracy drops from six State deputies to five or from five to four, the damage is small. On the contrary, the smaller parties may even lose their only seat, which will go abroad. So the reduction may be formally equal, but politically asymmetrical.
