Manolis Kottakis

Manolis Kottakis was born in Aegina in 1968. He is a graduate of the Law School of Democritus University of Thrace. He is a founding member of the Legal Union "for Democracy and Legislation." Currently, he is a columnist for the newspaper "Demokratia," a commentator for the magazine "Epikaira," and the radio station 9,84. His previous roles include: - Political Editor-in-Chief of "Eleftheros Typos" (2006-2009). - Political Editor-in-Chief of "Apogevmatini" (2002-2006). - Executive at Public Television (NET) from 2004 to 2010, where he hosted the weekly news program "Alli Opsi." - Executive at the radio station City 99.5 (2007-2009). He is a member of the Journalists' Union of the Athens Daily Newspapers (ESIEA). In 1996, he was awarded by the "A. Botsis" Foundation for Journalism and Production as the best young journalist. He worked for the newspaper "Apogevmatini" from 1993, covering reports for the Ministries of Transport, Interior, and Public Administration. He served as the head of the Press Office of Thrace for the General Secretariat of Press (1991-1993) and as a Communications Advisor to the Mayor of Piraeus, Christos Agrapidis (2000-2002). He worked as a correspondent for the Athens News Agency in Thrace (1990-1993) and was vice-president of the Program Committee of the Regional Station of ERA in Komotini. During the same period, he was an elected member of the Board of Directors of the Law Students' Association "Kostas Varnalis" and a student representative in the Senate. He was a founding member of the first free radio station in Thrace (1987, Radio Station "Paremvoli"). He teaches political reporting at the journalism school of IEK "AKMI." He began his journalism career at the newspapers "Alitheia" of Aegina and "Chronos" of Komotini. He is the author of the books: "Thrace, the Minority Today" (2000, Livani Publishing), "Islands of the New" (2005, I. Sideris Publishing), "Against the Dictatorships of Mediocrity" (2007, I. Sideris Publishing), and "Leaderships" (2008, Livani Publishing). He contributed to the collective volume "Struggle of Ideas" with texts on the Center-Right, edited by Marietta Giannakou (2010, Papazisis Publishing). He is married to journalist Vivian Benekou.