The class unions of Athens honored on Tuesday, November 16 the Polytechnic Uprising with laying of wraiths inside the historic area of the Polytechnic.
First laid wraiths the WFTU headed by its General Secretary, followed by PAME and the class unions.
Photos https://flic.kr/s/aHsmX8ujce
PAME has called for massive participation in the anti-imperialist demonstration on November 17 in Athens that will demonstrate at the Embassy of USA in Athens. Similar demonstrations will take place all over Greece
PAME statement for the anniversary of the Polytechnic Uprising
The Uprise of the Polytechnic lives in the Struggles of Today
PAME calls on the workers’ unions, the workers of all sectors to honor the anniversary of the Polytechnic Uprising with militancy, determination and escalation of the struggles for work-life with rights, for peace of the peoples against the plans of the imperialists.
The anti-dictatorship struggle, the common struggle of the youth-workers which culminated in the Polytechnic uprising, took place in the face of a barbaric, violent regime supported by the USA, against the military junta that was imposed by the bourgeoisie and the imperialist centers. At the same time, the junta tried to prevent any attempt to organize resistance and the claim of the people by banning, exiling, imprisoning, torturing and killing trade unionists and militants. At the same time, it exploited a number of employers’ puppets within the unions in order to impose inaction, disappointment and fatalism. While, the American 6th Fleet was sailing in the Greek seas and our country was functioning as an advanced outpost of the imperialist organizations.
Today, the unions are facing the laws of ND-SYRIZA that want to abolish the right to strike, to the trade union organization and to put a block to workers struggles. With the Hatzidaki law, they want to send the working class back to the Dark Ages to secure the profits of business groups. At a time when the pandemic counts 17,000 dead, they refuse to hire doctors, aiming to turn the National Public Health System into another profit machine for the private clinics who treasure from the victims of the pandemic. While the Universities and the schools become swimming pools in the rains and our children do their classes without teachers and professors, the Government is trying to impose the police inside the Universities. While the agreement on the USA-NATO bases signed by the SYRIZA Government and continues to be implemented by the ND Government have turned our country into a huge US military base.
Against the anti-workers’ policy, which goes hand in hand with the authoritarianism and repression against the Greek working class, the unions throughout the country must draw experience and conclusions from our struggles, modern and past. A few days after the great victory of the COSCO workers, a few weeks after the victory of the EFOOD employees and the shipbuilding workers, they confirm that our rights are conquered with organization and struggle. That governments, employers, mechanisms and systems are not invincible to the determined and organized working class.
Militant unions across the country are now proceeding with collective, massive procedures to organize the counterattack and escalate the struggle to meet the modern needs of workers, with Collective Agreements, Salary Increases, Free Public Health and Education. The large Conference of the unions in Athens on October 5 and the dozens of corresponding initiatives across the country led to mass rallies on November 4, a step of escalation and preparation of a broad strike front.
The rallies and the actions of the unions and the youth for the anniversary of the Polytechnic Uprising can be stations in the escalation of the struggle, for the justification of the demands and claims of the uprising of the Polytechnic
“US out – NATO out”
“Bread, Education, Freedom”
