Centre Union (Greece)
중도연합 (그리스)
A Greek centrist party founded on 19 September 1961 by Georgios Papandreou as a union of several centre parties. It won the 1963 and 1964 elections and governed, but after Papandreou resigned in 1965 following a clash with the Palace, defecting deputies backed royal-appointed governments in what became known as the Apostasia. It was outlawed after the 1967 coup, re-formed in 1974 as Centre Union – New Forces, and renamed the Union of the Democratic Centre in 1976.
In depth
According to the Greek source, until 1961 the centre was divided among Papandreou’s Liberal Democratic Party, Sofoklis Venizelos’s Liberal Party and others, some of which backed the Movement of National Regeneration headed by Georgios Grivas. On 19 September 1961, the day Prime Minister Konstantinos Karamanlis decided to dissolve parliament and call early elections, the Centre Union was founded by the union of many centre parties, including the Liberal Party, the Popular Social Party, the Progressive Party, the Democratic Union and the Party of Farmers and Workers; it was run by an eight-member committee chaired by Papandreou. Ranging from the left (Ilias Tsirimokos) to the anti-Karamanlis right (Stefanos Stefanopoulos), it had no single clear ideology; Papandreou’s charisma held it together.
In its first election on 29 October 1961 the Centre Union won 33.66% and 100 seats, losing to the National Radical Union (ERE). That election was marred by violence and fraud, and Papandreou declared a “relentless struggle” to restore democracy. On 3 November 1963 it became the largest party with 42.04% and 138 seats, and on 16 February 1964 it won 52.72% and 171 seats, and Papandreou formed a single-party government. The English source notes that the party had an official constitution, membership provisions and a youth wing, but its highest body, the congress, never met.
After Papandreou clashed with the Palace and resigned on 15 July 1965, King Constantine II gave the mandate in turn to Georgios Athanasiadis-Novas, Tsirimokos and Stefanopoulos, whose government won a confidence vote with the support of defecting Centre Union deputies. The English source says this “Apostasia” led directly to the military junta of 1967–1974. Under pressure from Papandreou’s second “relentless struggle”, elections were called for May 1967, but the April coup came first, and Papandreou died in November 1968.
According to the English source, after Papandreou’s death the outlawed party was placed under the titular leadership of Georgios Mavros, who reconstituted it in 1974 as Centre Union – New Forces. Andreas Papandreou declined its leadership and founded PASOK instead. The party rebranded as the Union of the Democratic Centre (EDIK) in 1976.