Greece: more cuts and a new wave of struggle
THE PASOK government announced on 7 October a new
bill savaging the jobs and conditions of public-sector workers. This
provoked another explosion of struggles, strikes and occupations in
almost every part of the public sector in Greece. The measures
announced, in line with the directives of the ‘troika’ (the IMF, EU, ECB),
amount to further huge attacks on the living standards of Greek workers.
According to the plan, public-sector workers will
suffer further wages cuts of 20-30%. Already, over the last 18 months,
they have seen their income fall by an average of 40%, according to
ADEDY, the civil servants’ union federation. The fact that thousands of
workers, who have their mortgage payments deducted from their pay,
received wages of between €10 and €30 or €40 for the first half of
October (wages are paid fortnightly) shows the scale of the attack.
Hundreds of thousands of families are being thrown into absolute poverty
and desperation. The declared plans of the ‘Troikans’ (as they are
referred to in Greece, and which includes the Pasok government) is to
drive down public-sector wages to the level of €500 to €550 net.
The government, which is hanging by a thread, also
intends to make 30,000 civil servants ‘reserve labour’ – a euphemism for
job losses – by the end of 2011. They will stop working and for the next
year will receive 60% of their (already reduced) wage. After that
period, if they do not find a job – which is more or less certain in the
current economic crisis – they will be sacked.
This means mass layoffs in the public sector. The
government intends to extend this measure to include a further 70,000
public-sector workers for 2012, although the troika is demanding that
the total number of jobs cut is increased to 250,000. The total number
of workers in the public sector is 687,000, costing much less than the
average in the 27 EU states, and includes the police, army, judiciary
and priesthood. Therefore, they want to sack more than one third of
public-sector workers! These huge cuts are in return for the latest
(sixth) tranche of bail-out funds by the IMF and the EU (of €8bn).
The truth is that the Troikans want also to crush
the workers’ movement, especially union organisation in the public
sector, which has been the most militant in the last couple of decades.
The social-democrat (Pasok) leadership of the unions have discredited
the role of trade unions in the eyes of many workers for years because
of their bureaucratic manoeuvres and betrayals. Now their government
wants to finish the job by crushing more workers’ rights.
These vicious attacks have led to the largest wave
of workers’ action in the public sector since the beginning of the debt
crisis two years ago. It started when a number of union activists in
different government departments occupied ministry buildings and
prevented the troika’s officers (who were in Athens to discuss the
details of the attacks with the Pasok government) from entering. It was
certainly a new experience for the highly paid IMF, ECB and EU
apparatchiks to have to move from place to place, in their luxurious
limousines, in an attempt to find somewhere to hold meetings!
The change in the mood of civil servants was clearly
shown during the general strike called by ADEDY on 5 October.
Participation in the strike was higher than 85%, and the demonstration
in Athens was, according to ADEDY, the biggest show of strength by
public-sector workers since the fall of the military dictatorship in
1974. The announcement of the new cuts’ programme led to a new wave of
anger and a tsunami of strikes, protests and occupations in the public
sector.
Since the start of October there have been
continuous and determined strikes and mass struggles, during which
almost the entire public sector is shut down. Every day, there are
massive protests, strikes and stoppages in different areas. The majority
of the government ministries and buildings are occupied by workers.
Just taking a walk around the centre of Athens or
any of the other big cities is enough for anyone to see the situation on
the ground: the streets are full of garbage because of a strike by
refuse workers. Many government buildings are closed and decorated with
banners saying, ‘Occupation!’ Nearly every day there is a demonstration
by some sector of the workforce.
This situation and the combative mood of
rank-and-file workers are pressing the leadership of the unions to take
more decisive action. ADEDY was compelled to change its initial call for
a 24-hour strike, on 19 October, to a 48-hour general strike. Then, the
private sector and public utilities union confederation, GSEE, also
changed its initial call for a 24-hour general strike to 48-hour action.
Thus both union confederations are now calling for a 48-hour general
strike on 19-20 October.
A number of union federations led by Pasok have been
forced to call for important industrial action. For example, the
leadership of the primary school teachers’ union proposed to its local
branches to go on ‘indefinite strike action’, and also called on ADEDY
to organise an indefinite general strike in the public sector. Many
local union branches are passing similar resolutions, asking the union
federations, in the public and private sectors, to hold repeated general
strikes.
Perhaps the most important development is the
decision of 23 trade unions federations in the wider public sector,
including public utilities, to co-ordinate their action against the
government, particularly given the refusal of the two union federations
to call for this action.
Even if at the present time the leadership of the
unions (especially in the public sector) appears to be combative,
workers do not (and cannot) trust them. If we want to continue and
intensify the struggle, workers need to control it democratically. This
is clear from the fact that in a number of workplaces the decision to go
into industrial action was taken by assemblies of rank-and-file workers,
against the will of the union leaderships.
In every workplace it is necessary to democratically
organise the struggle by electing committees controlled by workers’
assembles. This is the only way to conduct a successful struggle and to
keep a check on the leadership.
It is clear that the workers’ movement in Greece is
at a critical point. What happens next is fairly open. We could see a
workers’ movement which will escalate its struggles, put enormous
pressure on the union leaderships and even cause the Pasok government to
fall. We could also see more betrayals by the union leaders as they
retreat after gaining just minor concessions, or even no gains at all,
from the government.
To aid the workers’
struggle, the CWI in Greece (Xekinima)
calls for:
* Follow the 19/20 October 48-hour general strike
with a three-day general strike for the following week.
* For workers’ action in every public-sector
workplace. Every public-sector union federation to call repeated two- or
three-day strikes, on a weekly basis, linking this to indefinite
occupations of ministries, city halls, public buildings, etc, and
towards all-out indefinite action by all sections of workers, if
necessary, to decisively halt all cuts and attacks.
* Co-ordinate and develop the different struggles,
with the common aim of bringing down the government.
* For full democratic organisation of the workers’
movement, based on elected rank-and-file committees leading the
struggles
* Link these struggles to political demands,
including refusal to pay the debt and the nationalisation of the banks
under workers’ democratic control and management, as part of a socialist
programme to get rid of the barbarism of capitalism and to plan the
economy for the benefit of the majority, instead of for huge profits for
a handful of bankers and multinationals.
Xekinima fights for the building of a mass,
democratic political force, based on the struggles taking place and on
the programme above, which can channel the discontent and radicalisation
of workers and youth to struggle for a socialist alternative. For a
government of working people, the poor and youth, in opposition to the
growing misery of life under Greek and troika capitalism.
Dimitris Pantazopoulos
