Athens witnessed another day of traffic chaos due to the employee strike in the metro, suburban railway and the tram that took place in advance over the possible sale of TRAINOSE and the rolling stock maintenance company. This strike was legitimate, but not rational, since the employees think that by this way they can defend the public nature of transportation.
The union representatives claim that transportation is being surrendered to the “greedy, private, speculative interests” without any care for the dramatic consequences of these choices on the Greek people. The extent of how much these… greedy interests are willing to invest in Greece and transportation in particular was revealed when only one company was interested in TRAINOSE and none for the rolling stock maintenance company.
As for the dramatic consequences of the state of transportation, the people experience them when they use them everyday. Beyond the constant strike actions which make the life of passengers difficult, the situation in all means of public transportation – except perhaps the metro – is dramatic. More than have of the buses do not work, with the situation in the trolley’s and trains being just as problematic.
With the huge deficits growing each day from the lack of organization and non-payment of tickets, with the ticket machines being smashed by the dozen without any reaction, with buses unable to cross from …forbidden zones, the public transportation is becoming increasingly worse.
The calls to protect the public nature of transportation are good, however these strikes against everyone and everything are not conducive towards this target. Before the unionists degrade them even more to avert a sell off, for which nobody seems to care, they could strike for once about the mess, their inability to serve the people, for whom they are meant to be sacrificing themselves…
TO VIMA
