Who wants to start today by ferry from Piraeus on holiday, has to postpone his arrival: in protest against further austerity measures and privatization have begun in Greece on Wednesday extensive strikes. It is the second major labor dispute after the Conservative victory under Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.
Most affected by the outage is the area of traffic: Numerous ferries, which are supposed to bring tourists to the popular Greek islands, remained in the ports. According to the newspaper "Ekathimerini", passenger ships are affected in the ports of Piraeus, Rafina and Lavrio.
The subways and the trains did not run accordingly. The bus drivers from Athens put the work down for several hours. In Thessaloniki the buses are out all day.
In addition, all public schools will be on strike, reported the state television ERT. Because of the participation of the Association of Greek Journalists on the strike, there was no news on the radio and television from 6 o'clock. Newscasts should be available again after 24 hours.
The strike was called by the civil servants' union ADEDY, the communist union PAME and the umbrella trade union federation GSEE.
The conservative Mitsotakis had on 7 July replaced the left-wing Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and said he would fight the bureaucracy and promote the privatization. Although the government rules this out, the unions fear layoffs. In addition, the right to strike should be restricted. According to a new law, a strike should only be legal if more than 50 percent of the members of the union have agreed to it. So far, the decision of a union board was enough.
Already on 24th September numerous Greek trade unions had organized a labor dispute. All ferries had stayed in the ports because of the involvement of the sailors. Also affected were the metro and bus drivers from Athens.