Mitsotakis favorite as Greece heads to uncertain polls

Greece votes Sunday in a general election that could deliver a chaotic outcome, with the leading candidate, conservative Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, unlikely to garner a lead wide enough to avoid a new vote.

The EU country goes into the polls in fairly robust economic health, with unemployment and inflation falling and growth this year projected to reach twice that of the bloc — a far cry from the throes of a crippling debt crisis a decade ago.

But economic issues remain squarely in focus even though a post-Covid tourism revival helped Greece book growth of 5.9 percent in 2022.

The outgoing prime minister has urged voters not to squander hard-fought economic stability.

But his key opponent, the former leftist premier Alexis Tsipras, has warned that the rosy hard-line figures belie growing poverty as wages fail to keep pace with rising prices.

Tsipras is seeking a comeback after a first mandate in 2015 to 2019, during which he led rocky negotiations with creditors that nearly crashed Greece out of the euro.

Close to 10 million Greeks are eligible to cast a ballot, including 440,000 first-time voters.