ΟΛΜΕ

Complaint against the new Israeli criminal attack on Palestinian people

Another ruthless bloodshed of the Palestinian people in Gaza is  underway, caused by the Israeli occupation forces launching hundreds of raids and missile attacks, killing dozens of Palestinians, children being among them, and wounding hundreds of others. The Israeli leadership continues its terrorist operations in the Gaza Strip undisturbed, threatening even with land invasion ?if it deems necessary?.

Once more, the criminal state of Israel takes on the ?policeman?s role? in the wider region enjoying the complete tolerance and coverage of its high protectors in the US and the EU, as well as the support of the Greek government with which it has a political and military cooperation. Israel is escalating its aggressiveness against the Palestinian people in order to undermine its unity, to threaten peace in the region and perpetuate the occupation of Palestinian territories.

The Executive Board of OLME categorically denounces the new barbarous raid of the militarist state of Israel against the much-suffering Palestinian people. OLME also expresses its deep solidarity towards the just struggle for peace and national independence carried out by the Palestinian people.

Israeli attacks must stop now!

The Israeli occupation army must withdraw. There must be a Palestinian state on the basis of the 1967 borders, with Eastern Jerusalem as its capital.

Military exercises and all military cooperation agreements between Greece – Israel must be cancelled.

Solidarity with the Palestinian people!

You may download the related file in pdf format … here

OLME

INFORMATION ABOUT THE DEMONSTRATION ON 28-2-14 IN ATHENS

On the 28^th of February 2014, OLME organized demonstrations against the dismissals that will be forced on the 22-03-2014. The demonstrations took place at the same time the representatives of the troika were having discussions with the ministers of the Greek Government.

The discussions were about the dismissals of permanent teachers and other public servants.

The demonstrators suffered the fiercer attack ever by the police forces.

There have been 18 arrests and 4 injuries of protesters.

OLME made the following complaint:

?We denounce the unprecedented violent incidents caused by the continuous attacks of the police wherever we had manifestations of protest against the suspensions ? dismissals, against the policies of the Greek Government, the IMF and the EU.

The Government, scared by the growing reaction of workers struggling for their right to permanent and stable jobs, released the forces of repression to terrify us.

So, since the morning, after attacking the activist protest of teachers, school guards, cleaning women and other public servants on suspension waiting for their dismissal, the police proceeded to 17 adductions of teachers and school guards, the President of OLME, Themis Kotsifakis, included. The same situation was repeated later in front of the Minister of Finance, where the police forces showed an incredibly violent behavior, repulsing and hitting the demonstrators and doing extensive use of chemical gas.

From these attacks 4 of the demonstrators were injured and transferred to the hospital. Among them the President of POE-OTA (union of local authorities? workers) Th. Balassopoulos, while Gr. Kalomiris, teacher and member of the Executive Board of ADEDY (Confederation of public servants) was arrested and accused of disobedience and insult of authority!!

We denounce the autocratic actions of the Greek Government and the police violence.

We declare that we will not be terrified by any attack. We will continue our struggle so that not a single one of our colleagues, not a single one of any worker is fired.

We struggle for permanent and stable jobs for everyone.

The terrorism will not be tolerated.

Our struggle will continue until Victory.?

PRESS OFFICE OF OLME

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Full video of the activism early in the morning on the 28-03-2014

In the yard of the Ministry of Administrative Reform, by teachers, school guards and cleaning women in suspension, facing dismissals.

It resulted in 18 arrests, mostly of teachers, and the injury of a woman colleague.

http://youtu.be/-HvMmSZtPTg

Translation of the video on Alpha TV news bulletin, 28-02-2014

http://youtu.be/-HvMmSZtPTg

?Besiege? of the troika meeting with the Minister of Administrative Reform and discussing the dismissals of public servants. Teachers, school guards and cleaning women, in front of definitive dismissals in 22 days.

Arrests of trade unionists, tension and injuries.

For the last 7 hours, demonstrators face the police. Tension and violence.

As the result of frequent use of chemical gas by the police, a woman loses consciousness. By her unconscious body, her colleagues are being repulsed by the police.

The orders are clear: demonstrators must not approach the Ministry of Finance and the members of the troika.

Early in the morning, demonstrators tried to enter the Ministry of Administrative Reform.

At a small distance of the Ministry of Finance, trade unionists attempt to ?break? the barrier of the police.

Grigoris Kalomiris, teacher and trade unionist, is violently arrested. His arm is broken. His colleagues are struggling to set him free. Between them, the President of POE-OTA. The police are violently repulsing them. One more trade unionist lies injured in the street.

Themis Kotsifakis, President of OLME speaking on the camera: they are the terrorists, not the people.

A big operation is set by the police, so that the members of the troika can leave safely the Ministry of Finance. A bottle of water hits Paul Tomsen?s car.

In the meeting, the troika pressed for three things:

• Setting of the target for new suspensions in 2014
• The names of 12.500 of public servants for the second wave of suspensions in 2013 with a new deadline for March 2014
• The acceleration of the 11.000 dismissals in the public sector, provided in the memorandum for 2014

TO: OLME, EI/ETUCE member organisation in Greece

20 January 2014

Ref.: MR/PC/9572

Solidarity with Greece: Troika?s hand off education

The ETUCE, the EI European Region, fully supports the Federation of Secondary School Teachers of Greece (OLME) by joining in solidarity its demand to stop the grave policy of seeking for solutions in Greece via memoranda between the government and the troika. The memoranda also affect the crucial sector of education to an unprecedented level. This approach is seriously undermining the recovery from the crisis and, more disconcertingly, the future of Greek generations.

The government?s implementation of the memorandum agreed with the troika of international leaders – the European Commission, the European Central Bank, the International Monetary  Fund ? is severely harming public education, threatening the access to a basic human right as quality education for all is, while undermining the basis of democracy. Time has come for authorities at all levels to be aware of the extraordinary and dramatic contradiction between the European plans for economic recovery based on the crucial role of Education on one side, and the dismantling effects of the policies agreed between national authorities in Greece and the troika on the other.

The ETUCE is appalled by the figures denounced by OLME on the effects of the austerity measures on education and deplores backward-looking austerity policies expected to result in additional deep cuts in public education spending, heavy wage reductions, massive dismissals, suspensions and compulsory transfers of teachers to administration posts, unacceptable closures of Primary and Secondary schools. These effects are not only increasingly wasting the quality of education but they are also leading to alarming mass student dropouts.

In the same way, ETUCE strongly denounces national rulings disrespectful of the voice of the social partners in Greece, and condemns the new law on education (4186/13) establishing examination-centered systems in all Upper Secondary and Vocational Lyceums, passed without any prior consultation with social partners, according to OLME.

The ETUCE warns the Greek government about the catastrophic effects of the memoranda policy in education, and joins OLME in asking for a democratic involvement of social partners in decisions that affect and jeopardize the future of people in Greece. The reinforcement of national social dialogue is the only way to fight back austerity, when social cohesion is under such a serious attack.

The ETUCE will continue to raise awareness on those dramatic figures at all levels, and to diffuse OLME?s demands for action to its member organisations, European institutions, here included the European Commission, the current President and Members of the European Parliament, as well as the candidates to the new European Parliament to be elected in May this year.

The ETUCE urges all the stakeholders in this crisis in Europe to take active measures and to intensify the efforts to exit the crisis without hitting any further the fundamental right to access public education in Greece, hence endangering the future of entire generations.

Kind regards,

Martin R?mer

European Director

Yoy may download the related file in pdf format … here

Organisations all over Europe call the European Parliament to undertake a Report on  the situation of Human Rights. You may download the related file in pdf format in english and in french

Preventing Early School Leaving through the Use of ICT in Education

Report of the ETUCE Workshop

Athens, Greece, 20 September 2013

The workshop on preventing early school leaving through the use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in education was held in Athens on September 20, 2013. Representatives from European teacher unions came together to discuss how ICT can motivate and re-attract individuals at risk of exclusion from formal education. Representatives from the education employers and students? unions also joined the workshop.

You may download the Report in pdf format … here

Statement of support and solidarity for Greek public and private sector trades unions in their General Strike 6 November 2013

(Please forward this to all trade unions and confederations involved)

As members of the Greece Solidarity Campaign delegation which visited and met with leading and grass-roots trade unionists, social pharmacy and social solidarity centre organisers, municipal activists, university staffs, peace campaigners and political figures resisting austerity in the Athens area on 27, 28, 29 and 30 October 2013, we send a message of solidarity and greetings to Greek public and private sector trade unions and their members taking general strike action on Wednesday 6 November 2013.

Your struggle against austerity and the way austerity measures are abused to degrade social and political life throughout Greece is vital to us because if this can be inflicted on the Greek people, then it can be rolled out across the whole of Europe. We wish you victory in your struggle.

 Signed: Mary Compton (past National President, National Union of Teachers), Tony Simpson (Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation), Mike Davis (editor, ?The Chartist?), James Youd (Treasurer, Greece Solidarity Campaign), Cllr Isidoros Diakides (London Borough of Haringey), Bob Archer (President, Redbridge Association, National Union of Teachers), Simon Renton (National President, University and College Union), Christine Blower (president of NUT and ETUCE)

 And on behalf of and with the support of the whole Greece Solidarity Campaign