FACTBOX: Scandals, economic woes plagued Greek PM

(Reuters) - Greek Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis called snap elections on Wednesday [ID:nL2686436], taking a risky bet as his conservative party lags behind the opposition in polls.

Here are some of the reasons that led to this decline in opinion polls -- with the ruling party trailing 6 percentage points behind the opposition -- and his decision to end months of speculation with a vote:

ECONOMY

The global slowdown has hit the Greek economy hard, shaking its basic pillars - tourism and shipping. With Greece facing its first recession since 1993, budget revenues have slowed to a trickle, deficits have grown and debt has ballooned. The government, which rushed to support banks with a 28 billion euros aid package but imposed an array of taxes to plug budget holes, was seen as helping the rich and neglecting the needy.

Seen by investors as the euro zone's soft underbelly, Greece has the single currency bloc's second biggest debt as a percentage of GDP next to Italy's -- seen at 103.4 percent in 2009.

SCANDALS

After sweeping to victory in 2004, ending decades of socialist scandals and vowing to clean Greek politics, the Karamanlis government soon found itself accused of graft.

Scandals such as the sale of overpriced government bonds to state pension funds and suspect property deals between the state and wealthy monastery, took their toll. Although some ministers were sacked or resigned, none of the government officials involved ever got to trial and Karamanlis gave the impression that he either tolerated or was unable to end corruption.

VIOLENCE

After Greece's worst riots in decades in December 2008, violence has simmered with frequent gas canister attacks and some bomb attacks. The riots were triggered by the police killing of a teenager and were fanned by high youth unemployment and mistrust in the political system and a just society.

Leftist and anarchist groups have capitalized on the climate of social unrest to renew attacks on businesses, cars and police, culminating with the assassination of a policeman in his car in June. On Wednesday, a car bomb seriously damaged the Athens stock exchange and slightly injured one woman in what police suspect was a leftist guerrilla attack.

WEAK GOVERNMENT

The fragile one-seat majority made the government too weak to cope with both hard but necessary reforms and its own dissidents. Facing not only street protests but even resistance from within its own ranks, the government has been slow to implement structural reforms needed to boost competitiveness and put the economy on a long-term growth path.

A 2008 overhaul of the social security system, which experts warned would collapse in 15 years due to an aging population, fell short of what was necessary. Education reform, seen as crucial to making the labor market more competitive, had a similar fate amid violent protests.

FIRES

Greece's worst forest fires in memory killed 65 people in 2007 and caused a public outcry but the government narrowly won its second national election weeks later after handing out immediate cash to afflicted farmers of the Peloponnese peninsula and Evia island.

But destructive forest fires last month that razed thousands of acres of forest near Athens and damaged scores of homes were harder to weather. Critics said the government had learned nothing from the destruction two years ago and allowed anarchic development to sprout in burned forests, encouraging greedy developers.