Post by ferryfast admin on Feb 23, 2006 23:03:50 GMT -5
Seamen suspend strike, ferries back in work
Calm returned to Piraeus' dockside on Thursday as Greece's busiest commercial port resumed business following a crippling weeklong strike by ferry boat seamen overcome only after the government issued a back-to-work mobilisation order early Wednesday for all Greek-flagged vessels.
The seamen's union (PNO), meanwhile, suspended its ongoing 48-hour strike with a unanimous decision early Thursday afternoon by its executive committee. The industrial action was due to end at 6 a.m. Friday.
The decision meant that all tied up ferry boats were to resume service by 6 p.m. Thursday. According to reports, the union may now request that the merchant marine ministry lift the Feb. 22 back-to-work mobilisation order.
According to authorities, seven ferry boats carrying a total of 586 trucks left the port of Piraeus over the past 24 hours towards Crete and other Aegean island destinations. Another 11 vessels disembarked from various islands towards Piraeus, carrying more than 700 trucks and nearly 2,000 passengers.
In a related development, the government on Thursday flatly dismissed same-day press reports claiming it issued the back-to-work order while negotiations were still underway with PNO's leadership on Tuesday.
"Talks between the merchant marine ministry and PNO ended late Tuesday evening after the government was informed by the relevant minister (Manolis Kefaloyiannis) that negotiations failed to turn up any result, whereby it (government) proceeded with the specific decision (mobilisation), and taking advantage of constitutional rights. The talks collapsed at least one hour before the end of the calendar day Feb. 21," alternate government spokesman Evangelos Antonaros stressed.
Opposition, Parliament debate
On its part, main opposition PASOK issued a sharp attack against the government's actions vis-à-vis the seamen's strike, calling the government "untrustworthy, irresponsible and autocratic".
PASOK MP Anna Diamantopoulou, a former EU Commissioner, charged that ruling New Democracy party had reneged on its pre-election promises to the seamen's union and that it remained a deeply conservative party, while she also called the back-to-work order an "extreme measure".
Asked about a PASOK deputy's proposal -- made during a same-day Parliament debate -- to hire foreign flagged vessels and crews in place of the strikers, Diamantopoulou criticised the notion. She merely added that she was unaware of the specific comment and that official party policy is expressed by PASOK's relevant organs.
The proposal, whereby Cretan products are directly shipped to western Europe via Italian ports, was made by PASOK MP Manolis Stratakis, whose election precinct is on Crete, one of the strike's hardest hit areas.
"The merchant marine ministry could have intervened so that it had at its disposal foreign-flagged vessels to transport products without anyone interfering," Stratakis said in Parliament.
In reply, Minister Kefaloyiannis reminded that the government did not duplicate measures used by a previous PASOK government in 2002, when the latter issued a back-to-work order two days into a similar seamen's strike.
Finally, the minister asked whether Stratakis' proposal was an official PASOK position.
Coalition of the Left (Synaspismos) leader Alekos Alavanos, whose tabled question concerning government measures against the "bird flu" virus was the main object of Thursday's on-the-agenda Parliament debate, charged that the government is employing violence and pitting social groups against each other instead of following its pre-election programme.
"If you're not listening to PNO and Synaspismos, then listen to your own union leaders and deputies, who expressed different positions and who criticised you," Alavanos said.
In response, Minister of State and government spokesman Theodoros Roussopoulos emphasised that it is unacceptable to have two standards for wage-earners "when we have citizens that are cut-off (on the islands), who can't work or whose products are being destroyed. When the government, over six days, has exhausted every margin of dialogue, it has the right to take decisions within the framework of its constitutional privileges."
Finally, the spokesman repeated that the government increased a lump sum pension payment for retiring seamen by 25 percent a year ago, whereas a demand to eliminate taxes all together for lower ranking seamen, from a current rate of 3 percent, was unreasonable.
Calm returned to Piraeus' dockside on Thursday as Greece's busiest commercial port resumed business following a crippling weeklong strike by ferry boat seamen overcome only after the government issued a back-to-work mobilisation order early Wednesday for all Greek-flagged vessels.
The seamen's union (PNO), meanwhile, suspended its ongoing 48-hour strike with a unanimous decision early Thursday afternoon by its executive committee. The industrial action was due to end at 6 a.m. Friday.
The decision meant that all tied up ferry boats were to resume service by 6 p.m. Thursday. According to reports, the union may now request that the merchant marine ministry lift the Feb. 22 back-to-work mobilisation order.
According to authorities, seven ferry boats carrying a total of 586 trucks left the port of Piraeus over the past 24 hours towards Crete and other Aegean island destinations. Another 11 vessels disembarked from various islands towards Piraeus, carrying more than 700 trucks and nearly 2,000 passengers.
In a related development, the government on Thursday flatly dismissed same-day press reports claiming it issued the back-to-work order while negotiations were still underway with PNO's leadership on Tuesday.
"Talks between the merchant marine ministry and PNO ended late Tuesday evening after the government was informed by the relevant minister (Manolis Kefaloyiannis) that negotiations failed to turn up any result, whereby it (government) proceeded with the specific decision (mobilisation), and taking advantage of constitutional rights. The talks collapsed at least one hour before the end of the calendar day Feb. 21," alternate government spokesman Evangelos Antonaros stressed.
Opposition, Parliament debate
On its part, main opposition PASOK issued a sharp attack against the government's actions vis-à-vis the seamen's strike, calling the government "untrustworthy, irresponsible and autocratic".
PASOK MP Anna Diamantopoulou, a former EU Commissioner, charged that ruling New Democracy party had reneged on its pre-election promises to the seamen's union and that it remained a deeply conservative party, while she also called the back-to-work order an "extreme measure".
Asked about a PASOK deputy's proposal -- made during a same-day Parliament debate -- to hire foreign flagged vessels and crews in place of the strikers, Diamantopoulou criticised the notion. She merely added that she was unaware of the specific comment and that official party policy is expressed by PASOK's relevant organs.
The proposal, whereby Cretan products are directly shipped to western Europe via Italian ports, was made by PASOK MP Manolis Stratakis, whose election precinct is on Crete, one of the strike's hardest hit areas.
"The merchant marine ministry could have intervened so that it had at its disposal foreign-flagged vessels to transport products without anyone interfering," Stratakis said in Parliament.
In reply, Minister Kefaloyiannis reminded that the government did not duplicate measures used by a previous PASOK government in 2002, when the latter issued a back-to-work order two days into a similar seamen's strike.
Finally, the minister asked whether Stratakis' proposal was an official PASOK position.
Coalition of the Left (Synaspismos) leader Alekos Alavanos, whose tabled question concerning government measures against the "bird flu" virus was the main object of Thursday's on-the-agenda Parliament debate, charged that the government is employing violence and pitting social groups against each other instead of following its pre-election programme.
"If you're not listening to PNO and Synaspismos, then listen to your own union leaders and deputies, who expressed different positions and who criticised you," Alavanos said.
In response, Minister of State and government spokesman Theodoros Roussopoulos emphasised that it is unacceptable to have two standards for wage-earners "when we have citizens that are cut-off (on the islands), who can't work or whose products are being destroyed. When the government, over six days, has exhausted every margin of dialogue, it has the right to take decisions within the framework of its constitutional privileges."
Finally, the spokesman repeated that the government increased a lump sum pension payment for retiring seamen by 25 percent a year ago, whereas a demand to eliminate taxes all together for lower ranking seamen, from a current rate of 3 percent, was unreasonable.