Greek Prime Minister targets 'jobs for life' to restore voters' trust ahead of 2027 elections

Greece's prime minister proposed on Monday reviewing ministers' legal immunity and guaranteed "jobs for life" for state-sector workers in a bid to restore voters' trust after a graft scandal and to build support ahead of a 2027 national election.

Kyriakos Mitsotakis' centre-right government remains ahead in opinion polls but it has been shaken by a corruption scandal in which some farmers, aided by state employees, faked land ownership to get subsidies. The affair was revealed by EU prosecutors in 2025 and parliament is looking into the case.

Greeks were also angered by the government's handling of a 2023 train crash which killed 57 people, the country's worst on record. It triggered the biggest mass protests in Greece since a debilitating decade-long debt crisis. A trial opens next month, with protesters demanding full political accountability.

In Greece, only parliament can investigate ministers or lift lawmakers' immunity, according to the four-times-revised 1975 constitution.

"The world of 2026 is different and poses new challenges," Mitsotakis said in a letter to his 156 deputies in the 300-seat parliament and in a televised address. "The time is ripe for a brave constitutional revision towards a functional democracy."

To make public administration more efficient, Mitsotakis suggested that the lifelong job security enjoyed by state employees for more than a century should be reviewed, too, to address underperformance.

The constitution also needs to address modern challenges including artificial intelligence, affordable housing, the climate crisis, fiscal stability and a slow judicial system, he said, without proposing any specific measures.

Mitsotakis and his party took power in 2019 and were re-elected in 2023 for another four-year term.

For the proposed changes to come into effect, two successive parliaments need to approve them and an enhanced majority of 180 deputies is required in at least one of the two votes.

-Reporting by Renee Maltezou and Angeliki KoutantouEditing by Gareth Jones/Reuters