Less than 200 Greek citizens eligible to vote in Greece’s upcoming elections have registered to vote from Australia, whilst thousands of Turks are casting their vote in the Turkish presidential election.
SBS Turkish reported that “more than 3.5 million eligible voters outside of the country, including Australia, have already cast their votes” for Turkey’s presidential election. SBS Greek reported that “19,000 Turkish citizens living in Australia voted in the Turkish presidential elections.”
The low number of registered eligible Greek voters from Australia is not born of apathy, but rather the cumbersome and convoluted legislation that was passed by the Greek parliament in 2019, which in effect makes it almost impossible for Greek citizens living outside Greece to vote.
The May 20 elections will be the first time Greek citizens living abroad will have the opportunity to vote in general parliamentary elections without having to travel to Greece, as was the law prior to 2019.
New Democracy had its original bill watered down by left opposition parties like Syriza who fear that what they believe is a conservative Diaspora will work against their electoral goals.
For the election on May 20, polling stations are being set up only in Melbourne and Sydney, which means any voters from South Australia, Western Australia, the Northern Territory, and Tasmania will need to go to the Consulate General of Greece in Melbourne.
Smoke and mirrors
Only 22,855 Greeks of the more than seven million Greek citizens living outside Greece, had their applications for registration approved by the Department of Home Affairs, registered on the Greek overseas electoral registers, and of those less than 200 are Australian residents. Again, 3.5 million eligible Turkish citizens registered to vote from outside Turkey.
Stefanos Tamvakis, former President of the World Council of Hellenes Abroad (SAE) and Board Member of the Onassis Foundation, stated that the participation of Greek citizens in Greece’s elections from their countries of residence, either by ballot box or postal vote, has been a long-standing issue, despite the constitutional provisions for it.
“The law allowing the right to vote for Greek citizens outside Greece came as a nasty surprise for expatriate Greeks, because instead of facilitating their exercise to the right to vote it did the opposite and deprived them of that right.”
Tamvakis believes that the new law is arduous and convoluted and hampers anyone genuinely seeking to exercise their right to vote. A Greek citizen living abroad must also prove that they have lived in Greece for at least two years since 1985.
“The law denies these Greeks abroad the right to vote in their place of residence, on the grounds that they cannot prove that they have lived in Greece for two years since 1985.”
Even if they travel regularly to Greece, communicate with peers and family in Greece, maintain contact with Greece and are aware of the issues – they need to show continuous residence in Greece for a minimum of two years.
You can die for Greece but not vote for Greece as Diaspora
Yet, any Greek male, born outside Greece, or an expat who stays over three months in Greece without an extension, will be called to serve in the Greek Armed Forces. Ironically one can die for Greece even if they do not live, or even are born in Greece, but cannot vote in Greece.
The online registration process itself, as Neos Kosmos has been told by many, is a Kafkaesque nightmare.
“Greek citizens abroad, especially first-generation immigrants who left Greece during the post-war years and created democratic structures modelled on Greece, have the right to vote,” said Tamvakis.
This law he said impacts most egregiously on those 500,000 Greeks who left due to the catastrophic Greek Financial Crisis of 2008- 2016 to find work. Greeks who then sent and send back billions of dollars in reparations and assisted the revival of the Greek economy.
The absurdity is that these same citizens are now denied the right to vote, unless they travel to Greece where, with their physical presence, they can exercise their right to vote.
Tamvakis believes that for the 22,000, registered out of more than seven million Greeks abroad this law bore “bitter fruit” for citizens of a nation that gave birth to democracy.
He, has among others in the Diaspora such as Louis Katsos Louis Katsos the President of the East Mediterranean Business Cultural Alliance (EMBCA) in New York, feel these impediments undermine Hellenism, Greece’s foreign policy interests which diaspora play a fundamental role in lobbing for in the US, Canada, Australia and so on.
Katsos, who in January organised a forum from the United States, said that, “the right to vote and citizenship are linked.”
“There should be more discussion and not a one-way conversation coming from Hellas.”
Tamvakis, the former president of SAE concluded that Greece must ensure “that the inalienable right to vote in national elections without hindrance is facilitated.”
