The Koinotiki Ananeosi ticket headed by incumbent GOCMV President Bill Papastergiadis swept to victory at the elections for a new Board in the Greek Orthodox Community of Melbourne Victoria (GOCMV) on Sunday.
“Community will be open for all, irrespective of where they stood before the election the main focus will be on on the current projects moving forward.” – Bill Papastergiadis, President of the Victorian Greek Community
Mr Papastergiadis’ team managed to have all of its 19 candidates elected as new GOCMV Board members.
The Koinotiki Ananeosi ticket managed to secure 53.68 percent of the vote as opposed to 44.08 percent for the Community Transparency and 2.24 percent for the independent candidates.
The Community
Transparency ticket led by Treasurer Con Dikeos did not secure any positions in the newly elected Board.
Long serving board members such as George Fountas, Jenny Krasopoulaki and Eugenia Grammatikakis also failed to get elected.
The results were officially announced today by the Electoral Commission which was
responsible for the conduct of the elections.
In total 2,198 GOCMV members cast a vote on Sunday. Of this total number, only 88 votes were deemed informal.
43 candidates stood for election with 38 nominated as part of formal tickets and five who stood as independents.
After the results were announced the
head of the winning, Bill Papastergiadis said: “The result is one for the Greek Community and for the paroikia in general; it’s not a personal result. Despite being a vote of confidence it also bestows upon us responsibilities.”
abilities.”
Mr Papastergiadis went on to emphasise his commitment to unity and inclusiveness.
“The Community will be open for all, irrespective of where they stood before the election,” he said. “The main focus will be moving forward the current projects.”
His immediate priorities will be finalising projects
for the upcoming Antipodes Festival and the program of works for Alphington Grammar.
The re-elected President revealed that he didn’t expect such a big result but he pointed out that during the election day many people who he didn’t know approached him and vouched their support to him while stressing “the need for change”.
Mr Papastergiadis said that his intention is to serve the full
three years of his term, putting to rest rumours that want him leaving the presidency before the end of the term.
On the other hand Con Dikeos was disappointed with the final result.
“We anticipated a better result but in any case congratulations to the President of the Greek Community, Bill Papastergiadis and his team for their success on Sunday. We wish them the best of luck in the next three years. As a group we will maintain our presence within the Greek Community; [we will be] remaining active and supportive.”
Mr Dikeos contacted Mr Papastergiadis late last night to offer his, “sincerest congratulations on their election victory” and he pledged his support to the “whole Board of the Greek Community.”
The team of Koinotiki Ananeosi managed to secure 53.68 percent of the vote as opposed to 44.08 percent for the Community Transparency and 2.24 percent for the independent candidates.
Voting list
The list of candidates in descending order is as follows:
Bill Papastergiadis 1203
Leonidas Vlahakis 1198
Theo Andrianakos 1187
Tammy Iliou 1186
Nick Koukouvitakis 1177
Theo Markos 1166
Costas Markos 1162
Jorge Menidis 1139
Vassilios Anevlavis 1138
Vasso Zangalis 1137
George Kallianis 1126
Nicole Iliopoulos 1124
Jim Bossinakis 1124
Dimitris Iakovakis 1112
Kostas Tsoubakos 1105
George Koletsis 1094
Paul Kounnas 1094
Nick Parthimos 1092
John Mitsakos 1067
Eugenia Grammatikakis 1037
Con Dikeos 994
Jenny Krasopoulaki 989
George Fountas 955
Savvas Grigoropoulos 951
Apostolos Kounelis 950
John Kotsifas 938
John Lioupas 937
Zisis Pouros 931
Eleni Kavnoudias 929
Helen Panagiotopoulos 929
Kathy Karasavidis 927
Polyhronis Papadopoulos 926
Aggelos Haritou 917
Tom Karatzas 909
Dimitri Stamatopoulos 907
Aggelos Koukoulas 898
Emmanuel Starakis 867
Bill Korras 874
Christos Fifis 206
Paul Mavroudis 144
George Dikeakos 136
Kyriakos Papadimitropoulos 134
John Haitidis 83
