The domestic political scenery

The domestic political scenery was altered dramatically during 1936. The political impasse after the elections of January 1936 and the sudden death of the new Prime Minister, M. Demertzis, put the until then Deputy Prime Minister, I. Metaxas, in charge of a government with extraordinary powers for a period of five months, and in the explicit understanding that it would lead the country to free elections by autumn. Two months earlier, in November 1935, a plebiscite had decided the return of King George II to the throne of Greece, in spite of protests from the opposition about violations of the constitution and use of intimidation tactics by the pro-monarchical camp. The return, however, of George II led to the aggravation of the atmosphere of national division.

The decision of the new Metaxas government to suspend the parliamentary function moved the expression of opposition to extra-parliamentary forms of political protest and active disobedience. The efforts of the government to appease and curtail the oppositional attitude of labour organisations were rejected by the opposition because of the insistence of government legislation on compulsory arbitration of labour differences and tighter control of state funding to the trade unions.