GREEK public sector workers went on a 24-hour national strike on Wednesday against the so-called government ‘mobility scheme’ to bring in tens of thousands of sackings.
The strike was called by the ADEDY (public sector workers’ confederation) which have also called a two day national strike next week.
The government are also planning to shut down 23 state institutions and organisations and sack all the workforce. But a judge on Tuesday ruled as ‘contrary to the Constitution’ the government action which was demanded by the troika of EC-IMF-ECB.
Workers held rallies and marches in all Greek cities on Wednesday. In Athens the 500 sacked Finance Ministry cleaners demonstrated at the Reforms Ministry building but they were pushed away by the armed riot police.
On Tuesday at the port of Piraeus about 800 dockers held a rally and march against the privatisation of the biggest Greek port, apparently to be handed over to the Chinese state firm Cosco which already owns a part of the port.
A statement by the Trotskyists of the Revolutionary Marxist League (RML) called on the Piraeus Trades Council to adopt immediately a plan against privatisations by mobilising the whole working class and youth of the city in blockading the port’s exits, the transport system and the banks.
The RML called on the Trades Council and all trades unions to form a People’s Assembly and workers’ defence squads to assist and protect strikers.
The RML sees this struggle as part of the Greek workers’ fight to throw out the trades unions’ bureaucrats and elect a new revolutionary leadership in the unions and in the working class and to organise an indefinite political general strike to get rid of the parliamentary junta imposed by the troika, and go forward to a workers and small farmers’ socialist government.