Images via PAME and KKE screenshots and posts of rally in Athens
The Communist Party of Greece (KKE) reports that Workers’ May Day, a symbolic day in the struggle of the workers all over the world for the abolition of exploitation, was commemorated by thousands of strikers in 71 cities in Greece, including Athens and Thessaloniki, by mass strike rallies and demonstrations, organized by the class-oriented trade unions rallied in the All Workers’ Militant Front (PAME).
The demonstrators across the country demanded better working and living conditions; collective labour agreements with wage increases and extension of rights; measures against high prices; immediate abolition of the anti-labour laws that strike a blow to the 8-hour working day, criminalize trade union activity and prohibit the right to strike; 7-hour working day – 5 days a week, enabled by the advance of science and technology; immediate measures for the health and safety of the workers in workplaces; disengagement from imperialist plans and war conflicts. The strike rallies expressed solidarity with the Palestinian people, and denounced the orgy of police repression against US students.
Giannis Tasioulas, president of the Federation of Builders, addressed the May Day strike rally in Athens, which took place outside the parliament, and stated, among other things, that “May Day is our day. It is the day of the workers in the entire world and it marks the relentless struggle of our class for the abolition of the exploitation of man by man. For a world without capitalist exploitation, poverty, wars and refugees. A world worthy of the needs and interests of the many and not for the profits of the few (...) From May Day in Chicago, May Day 1936 in Thessaloniki, May Day 1944 in Kaisariani, when 200 communists stood defiantly before the Nazi firing squad, to the present day, the same message has guided our struggle: We will not yield, we will not retreat, we will not be intimidated, we refuse to compromise with the barbarity of capitalist exploitation, wars, refugees and poverty”.
Dimitris Koutsoumbas, General Secretary of the Central Committee of the KKE, took part in the strike rally in Athens and made the following statement to media outlets:
“Today, on May Day, the international working class is inspecting its forces, increasing the level of participation in its trade unions, changing the negative correlation of forces from bottom to top, organizing and promoting the social alliance of the working class with all popular strata, against the monopolies, against capitalism. And above all, it is organizing and fighting for contemporary social rights; for all rights to work, education, health, culture, against war and poverty, for all spheres of the social and personal life of workers, self-employed, farmers, youth and women”.
