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21:36 GMT – Closing down the live blog now, to write a first analysis of the results. Look out for it tomorrow morning. Thank you for your support.
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21:25 GMT – Alexis Tsipras, full statement:
I want to thank you from the heart for this great victory. For this clear victory. This victory is the people’s. We gave a clean and hard battle and today I feel vindicated, because the Greek people have given us a clear mandate to continue to struggle on their behalf, both within and outside this country, to lift people’s spirits.
In difficult circumstances, the Greek people gave us a clear mandate to do away with all that keeps us stuck in the past and continue our beautiful struggle, the struggle we started seven months ago, to manage to make fairness a priority, faced with great powers and great enemies. We managed to raise the Greek flag not only in our streets, but in the streets of every capital around Europe. Today Greece and its people are a symbol, synonymous with dignity and revolution and that revolution we will continue together for the next four years. That is our mandate.
I want to thank young people who fought alongside us, to thank working people from poor neighbourhoods. SYRIZA has proved that it is too tough to be kept down. Even when everyone targeted us, we proved that our connection with the working classes, with people who understand hard graft. This result does not belong to SYRIZA, but to those people who dream of a better tomorrow. We can only achieve this through every day battle and every day work.
Friends, we have difficult times ahead, but we are on solid ground, our feet are planted firmly, we have prospects. The crisis will not end magically, but it will end. Through hard work and planning, through persistence and fighting spirit. Through efforts to boost the economy and return to growth, but this growth to have a socialist mark, to include the redistribution of wealth and the protection of the weakest.
Friends, this mandate is also a crystal clear demand to end the dominance of corruption and nepotism which for so many years has ruled our country. It has given us a second and substantial chance to do away with this establishment. We will be judged after four years on those results. Tomorrow we begin.
I want to thank warmly Independent Greeks (ANEL) and Pannos Kammenos in particular, who once again will unite his strength with ours, unite their flag with ours, under the banner of decency and social struggle. Tomorrow we continue our battle together. I also want to thank the Greens who were with us both here and in the wider European context. Things will change in Europe. Europe will not be the same after voters here have confirmed our seven-month wrestle with it. From tomorrow we continue to change relationships in the EU.
[Panos Kammenos, takes to the stage and gets a huge hug from Tsipras and a huge round of applause from the crowd.]
Tomorrow we roll up our sleeves and start to work hard, to support the weakest and the poorest, to raise the sun above our country, for a Greece that has equality, justice, fairness and prosperity. So, that after four years, we may have a country that is stronger and fairer and a people who are proud and standing tall. Power to you. Thank you.
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20:50 GMT – Leventis, leader of Union of Centrists (EK): “Our mission is to clean up the country.”
Their anti-corruption focus may actually be quite a good fit for SYRIZA’s coalition. Will Tsipras extend a hand to boost his majority?
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20:43 GMT – Stavros Theodorakis, leader of POTAMI hints he may step down: “When things go wrong, the person with whom the bulk of the blame stops is the leader. I understand my responsibility.”
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20:41 GMT – Pablo Iglesias, leader of Podemos in Spain: “The Greeks have said very clearly who they want as Prime Minister. Congratulations, Alexis. Power to you, friend.”
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20:35 GMT – First impressions of election result by Nick Malkoutzis in the Guardian (caveat: Nick is a commentator for a right-wing paper):
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/sep/20/greece-tsipras-victory-syriza-permanent-break
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20:30 GMT – Map of how regional results are shaping up in Greece. Pink is SYRIZA, blue is NEW DEMOCRACY.
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20:19 GMT – Zoe Konstantopoulou statement: “The 45% who did not vote are a reflection of the victory of antidemocratic forces in Europe. We will be back and put the people back in charge, sooner than you think.”
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20:16 GMT – Panayiotis Lafazanis of breakaway SYRIZA faction Popular Unity, thanks people who voted for LAE, condemns “below the belt attacks” and warns of “impending Armageddon”.
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20:05 GMT – How young people voted: (order of parties SYRIZA, ND, GD, POTAMI, KKE, ANEL, PASOK, LAE, EK). Youth overwhelmingly with Tsipras.
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19:53 GMT – How unemployed people voted: (order of parties SYRIZA, ND, GD, POTAMI, KKE, ANEL, PASOK, LAE, EK). Startling statistic on Golden Dawn, level-pegging with SYRIZA. If anyone needed to know how to defeat fascism, that is the answer: jobs.
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19:49 GMT – Results now (first column) as opposed to January (second), with variation (third column). Parties in order: SYRIZA, NEW DEMOCRACY, GOLDEN DAWN, PASOK/DIMAR (no previous as, officially, newly constituted), KKE, POTAMI, ANEL, CENTRIST UNION.
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19:40 GMT – The polls did not get it wrong on this occasion. Criticism seems misplaced. Syriza managed to increase the compacting of its vote (convincing people who voted for it before to vote for it again) from 50-60% in the last polls to 75% in the last 24hrs. This was always the key to this being close or not. As I wrote earlier, SYRIZA’s vote was always the one with the most potential to surprise.
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19:35 GMT – Visibly relieved, even happy, faces at the studio of state broadcaster ERT, reopened by SYRIZA. Sullen, funereal atmosphere at some of the private broadcasters facing licensing and tax questions.
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19:20 GMT – Tsipras reported to have already called leader of ANEL, Panos Kammenos, to reform their coalition government. Possibility of strengthening their projected 155 seats with another small party, but it looks as if #Greece may have a new government tonight.
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19:02 GMT First official projection by Singular Logic (collector of the results) based on a quarter of the votes counted. SYRIZA has a 7.5% lead, ANEL is in, LAE is out.
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Alexis Tsipras: In front of us, the long road of struggles and hard work.
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18:49 GMT – This is true. LAE will become a cautionary tale.
Hugo Dixon @Hugodixon · 4m4 minutes ago
Combo of biggish win for Tsipras & Lafazanis not getting any MPs wd give Tsipras strong hand to face down any new Syriza rebels
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18:38 GMT – Leader of New Democracy, Vaggelis Meimarakis, congratulates Alexis Tsipras and invites him to form “the right government”. He seems to be conceding defeat, based on the results so far.
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18:27 GMT – Upper limits of latest exit poll leaves open the marginal possibility of the SYRIZA/ANEL coalition simply continuing (143 + 9 = 152 Seats), possibly with the addition of new centrist entrants EK. Considering the signing of a third bailout, the splintering of SYRIZA and media onslaught, this is a remarkable victory for Alexis Tsipras.
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18:16 GMT – Exit Poll for ERT now based on 100% of sample. SYRIZA pushing towards the higher estimate of the earlier Exit Poll, ND towards the lower. ANEL look like they’re in as well as the centrist EK. Breakaway rebels Popular Unity LAE may not make the threshold and POTAMI down significantly. PASOK recovery, KKE gains. GOLDEN DAWN pretty close to its usual percentages, despite refugee crisis.
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17:59 GMT – PASOK Headquarters: “New Democracy will have to be included in any coalition in order for PASOK to participate.”
What a bizarre and, some might say, sinister statement.
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17:56 GMT – Athens Live predicting turnout around 64%. Much higher than originally envisaged.
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17:53 GMT – Lakis Lazopoulos (prominent Greek comedian): “First party is the anger of abstention.”
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17:48 GMT – Pappas (high ranking SYRIZA): “Coalition with New Democracy is out of the question.”
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17:45 GMT – Unwise to speculate based on Exit Polls. The precise numbers make a huge difference. With three parties marginally in/out and an error spectrum of 3% we simply don’t know.
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17:36 GMT – Kappa Research EXIT POLL (telephone):
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17:26 GMT – University of Macedonia poll:
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17:24 GMT – If the aggregate Exit Polls hold around their middle value, the seats will go something like this: SYRIZA 132 ND 78 GD 19 ΚΚΕ 16 PASOK 16 POTAMI 12 ΕΚ 10 ANEL 9 LAE 8.
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Paul Mason @paulmasonnews · 11m11 minutes ago Attica, Greece
Syriza between 30-34% in exit polls despite abstentions – ND grew it’s support back to within 2-3% with new more liberal leader
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Damian Mac Con Uladh @damomac · 12m12 minutes ago
If 9 parties make it to parliament, this will be highest number since 1950, when there were 10. In May 2012 were 8.
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17:04 GMT –
#GreekElections
ERT AGGREGATE EXIT POLL:
SYRIZA 30-34%
ND 28.5-32.5%
GD 6-8%
PASOK 5.5-7%
KKE 5.5-7%
POTAMI 4-5.5%
ANEL 3-4%
EK 3.2-4.2%
LAE 2.5-3.5%
TURNOUT c60%
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16:40 GMT – Polls in Greece close and the exit poll is announced in 20 minutes.
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16:26 GMT – Strong reaction from POTAMI, to a New Democracy candidate posting on Facebook a status asking people not to vote Potami; possibly in contravention of electoral rules.
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16:20 GMT – Turnout predicted by most pundits to be very low. As I wrote in my election primer, this will probably be negative for Alexis Tsipras, as it is his voters who were least motivated.
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16:17 GMT – Panayiotis Lafazanis (leader of POPULAR UNITY): “Every vote lost to abstention is a vote for austerity. Soon the youth of OXI will win”
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16:12 GMT – Reports of confrontation between police and Golden Dawn supporters outside a polling station near the area where Pavlos Fyssas was murdered.
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16:04 GMT – Here we go. The Greek election live coverage begins.
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13:28 GMT – Updates will begin at 6pm, Greek time (4pm GMT).