Leftist victor says Greece's bailout is history

The opposition party earned 36 per cent of the vote, falling short of an absolute majority in the 300-seat parliament by two seats, the Interior Ministry said.

   

Its success could have profound ramifications for the future of the eurozone, which is already suffering from a host of economic ills, and provoke a confrontation with Greece's international creditators.
   

Thousands of SYRIZA supporters flocked to Athens University chanting and waving the party's red and white flags as party leader Alexis Tsipras addressed the crowd.
   

"The vote of the Greek people has closed the vicious circle of austerity," he said, declaring Greece's 240-million-euro (270-million-dollar) bailout now "a matter of the past."
   

He promised to "try to negotiate with our international partners" to find "mutually viable solutions."
   

Outgoing prime minister Antonis Samaras conceded defeat in a telephone call congratulating Tsipras.
   

"I took over the country when it was on the brink of catastrophe and was given burning coals in my hands," said Samaras, who has led Greece since 2012. "We averted the worst and reestablished the credibility of the country."
   

During the month-long election campaign, Samaras was never able to energize support for his conservative New Democracy party. 

It placed second with almost 28 per cent of the vote and 76 seats in Parliament.
   

With SYRIZA's clear victory, four decades of rule by either New Democracy or the centre-left PASOK, a party now a shadow of its former self, was set to end. 

A SYRIZA-led government would be the first left-wing party to govern Greece.
   

In third place was the extreme-right Golden Dawn with 6 per cent and 17 seats.
   

Most the nationalistic party's senior officials are behind bars on charges of running a criminal organization. 

Party leader Nikolaos Michaloliakos, called a neo-Nazi by state prosecutors, rallied supporters ahead of the election via voice messages from prison.
   

"We achieved this great victory at the same time that we were unable to have a fair and democratic election campaign," a Golden Dawn statement said.
   

"We were cut off from everyone due to a dirty political game waged against us. Everyone knows that we are innocent."
   

SYRIZA will have three days to form a government once it is formally asked by Greek President Karolos Papoulias, expected to occur on Monday.
   

In an unlikely but not impossible twist, the president would be required by the constitution to invite Golden Dawn to try and form a government should both SYRIZA and the second place party fail to do so.
   

No group has yet emerged as a likely coalition partner for SYRIZA, although the middle-of-the-road To Potami party and the right-wing Independent Greeks have been suggested as possibilities.
   

Tsipras, 40, would become Greece's youngest-ever prime minister, as well as the first head of a populist movement to take power in an EU capital since the debt crisis erupted in 2010.
   

Samaras had pleaded with voters to stick with the salary cuts tax increases that meant to stabilize the battered Greek economy, which has seen massive public sector layoff and privatizations.
   

In contrast, Tsipras promised to keep Greece in the euro but abandon the austerity measures required by the emergency bailout negotiated with the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund.
   

Although Tsipras' anti-austerity and anti-EU rhetoric has moderated recently, renewed investor fears of a Greece exit from the eurozone were reignited in the run-up to the election.
   

Greece emerged from a six-year recession in November, but unemployment remains around 25 per cent and public debt last year was a staggering 175 per cent of gross domestic product.
   

Beyond the economic implications, a SYRIZA triumph could unsettle the European political establishment by providing a boost to populist parties surging across Europe, from left-wing Podamos in Spain, whose leader is a close ally of Tsipras, to the far-right Jobbik in Hungary, experts said.
   

The snap election was triggered in December after Samaras failed three times to secure parliamentary backing for his nominee for president.
   

If all attempts at forming a coalition are unsuccessful, Greece's president could call for talks to form a unity government. 

If those break down - as happened in 2012 - new elections will be called.