ADVERTISEMENTVangelis Meimarakis is the president of New Democracy Party after the resignation of Antonis Samaras.
Vangelis Meimarakis born 14 December 1953, is a Greek lawyer and politician who served as the Speaker of the Hellenic Parliament from 2012 to 2014.
Previously he was Minister of National Defence of Greece from 2006 to 2009.
He was born in Athens, and is a Cretan. Meimarakis joined New Democracy in 1974.
He was involved in student union politics while at Panteion University and was a founding member of ONNED, the New Democracy youth organisation.
He was appointed chairman of the ONNED Executive Committee in 1984, and led the organisation to its 1st Conference in March 1987. He has been a member of the New Democracy Central Committee since the 2nd Party Conference in Thessaloniki.
He was elected MP for the Athens B constituency for New Democracy in the general elections of 1989 (June and November), 1990, 1993, 1996 and 2000. He served as Deputy Minister for Culture (Sports) from 1992 to 1993.
He was general secretary of New Democracy until his appointment as Defence Minister on 15 February 2006.
He is married to Ioanna Kolokota and has two daughters. On 29 June 2012 he became Speaker of the Hellenic Parliament, a position he held until the next Parliament was elected in January 2015.