Greek truck drivers have been mobilising all week in Greece while the Greek parliament considered and eventually passed legislation to deregulate the road based freight industry in Greece.
We have nothing more to lose.
Greek truck drivers were due to meet yesterday in Athens to consider what further action they will take following a week, which saw hundreds of truck drivers continue with their protests against the reforms, causing traffic chaos on national highways and clashing with police in the city centre.
Truckers, many of whom had spent Tuesday night in a sit-down vigil outside Parliament, watching the reform bill debate on a large television screen brought along for the purpose, continued their protest on Wednesday and Thursday.
There were minor scuffles with police as some of the demonstrators threw stones at the Parliament building, while others pushed their way through to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
Police fired tear gas to disperse the small but boisterous crowd, as protesters chanted, “Thieves, thieves.”
The new legislation will significantly reduce freight prices by issuing new public-duty operator licences for the first time in 40 years, at a fraction of the current cost of purchasing a licence.
“We will keep going,” Giorgos Tzortzatos, the president of the truck drivers’ union said after the vote.
“We have nothing more to lose,” he said.
Truck drivers claim the new law, which aims to drastically reduce freight costs by issuing new cheaper operating licenses, is unfair to existing operators, many of whom have paid up to 300,000 euros for their licenses.
However Greek Transport Minister Dimitris Reppas insisted the reform is already overdue since other European countries had deregulated their road freight industry decades ago.
“Greece is the only country out of the 27 in the European Union that still has these restricted rules (for truckers),” he told parliament during the debate on the legislation.
“Everyone knew this reform had to happen.”