HUNDREDS of thousands of workers, youth, self-employed and small shopkeepers took part last Wednesday in the mass and militant demonstrations throughout Greece as part of the one-day general strike called by the GSEE (Greek TUC) against the new savage austerity measures of the three-party coalition government.
In Athens over 100,000 people marched through the city centre to the Vouli (Greek parliament) shouting ‘overthrow the government’, ‘kick out the troika’ and ‘for a permanent general strike’.
A most popular slogan chanted was ‘Lisbon, Madrid, Rome, Athens – one struggle one fight’.
Workers from the public sector formed the bulk of the march. For the first time, thousands of self-employed participated. The small business and shop-keepers association had called for all shops to be shut to 3.00pm. In the centre of Athens not a single shop, bank or department store opened up.
The general strike was almost total in the civil service, hospitals, ports, chemical and shipbuilding industries, post office, mines and construction sites. High participation was reported from schools, banks and the clothing industry.
As marchers congregated in the square in front of the Vouli building in Athens, they were viciously attacked by the armed riot police with tear-gas canisters and sprays and then with truncheon charges. The government feared that demonstrators would attack the Vouli and ordered the police to clear the square.
As with past massive demonstrations in Athens, conditions of a generalised uprising against the government were apparent in the slogans chanted on the march, reflecting the demand of the working class for an all-out indefinite general strike until the troika of ECU-IMP-ECU are thrown out.
A most important development in the class struggle was the huge and extremely militant demonstrations that took place in all Greek cities.
Tens of thousands marched in the large Greek cities of Salonica, Patras and Iraklio in Crete. In small towns, with a population of less than 5,000, it appeared that the whole town was out in the streets. In some cases, as videos showed, the banners held by demonstrators were wider than the streets of the small towns.
In the Athens area, riot police carried out mass arrests prior to the demonstration in the Aghios Demetrios, Zografou and other districts. Eyewitnesses said that people were arrested en mass, put in police vans and taken to the Athens police HQs.
Thousands of riot police were employed to defend the Vouli building. Metal fences and barricades were put up by police. At about 2.00pm, as the last of the anarchist and anti-state youth contingents entered Syntagma Square from its west side, riot police launched an attack with noise and smoke bombs.
Demonstrators reacted with fruit and plastic water bottles. But then a group from a side street ran towards the riot police and threw two petrol bombs at them.
That was the pretext for a co-ordinated riot police attack from the west and from the east side of the square with a liberal use of tear-gas canisters and sprays.
The march was cut in two: behind the anarchist youth contingents were the very large students’ contingents and those of left-wing parties and organisations. But despite the riot police action the students proceeded and entered the square marching to the Vouli building on the other side.
Now the riot police launched a truncheon charge from all sides complete with tear-gas canisters thrown into the crowd. In about 15 minutes the riot police had pushed all demonstrators out of the square, which was their aim from the start.
In contrast to previous police action at mass demonstrations, this time riot police did not chase demonstrators leaving the square due to the toxic tear-gas fumes.
Youth put up a strong fight against the riot police and over 100 arrests were made. Police HQs announced that 21 were to be charged with obstruction. Hundreds of students and youth turned up on Thursday morning at the Court where the 21 were to appear, demanding their release.
Last Wednesday night, following the massive Athens demonstration, residents of the Zografou district staged a protest rally in their area demanding the release of those arrested that morning.
The Greek Communist Party held their own separate marches in Athens and in other cities.
The treacherous trade union bureaucrats of the GSEE and ADEDY (public sector trades unions) once again called a one-day strike as a way of easing workers’ anger.
They refused to organise a solid general strike: large factories and enterprises, and the privatised communications sector and other industries, were allowed to work as normal.
Media workers held their one-day national strike separately last Monday.
The GSEE bureaucrats used the Athens marches as pressure against the government’s barbaric plans for wage and pensions cuts and the sackings of tens of thousands in the public sector.
Once the GSEE contingents were in Syntagma Square they were ordered to pack up and leave as the Communist Party had done earlier.
Several trade unions and some left-wing parties had been calling for an ‘encirclement’ by demonstrators of the Vouli building to force the overthrow of the troika-imposed coalition government.
These forces think that mass protest action by itself can get rid of the Greek parliamentary junta.
They have refused to support the call for an indefinite political general strike and for a fight to throw out the bureaucracy from the GSEE and ADEDY. Likewise, in agreement with the Greek Communist Party, they pay lip service or they are hostile to the movement of People’s Assemblies.
Workers in Greece now realise that a ‘permanent’ all-out strike to overthrow the government is the task ahead.
A most important struggle is now taking place as the working class and its middle class allies fight to break the fetters imposed not just by the trade union bureaucracy but also by the Greek Communist Party and the left-wing parties who do not want a struggle for workers power.
The Revolutionary Marxist League views the present situation in Greece as fully revolutionary and calls for workers to throw out the fake reformist and Communist Party bureaucrats, to organise an indefinite political general strike along with the People’s Assemblies and occupations to get rid of the troika government, and to go forward to workers power, through a socialist revolution to get rid of capitalism.
The Greek government is now preparing next year’s Budget. The Finance Ministry has published figures that show that in the January-August period of this year, the Greek government paid 40.3bn euros – that is 54 per cent of all expenditure – to the international bankers and to the European Central Government to ‘service’ its debt!
