A massive "no» to
Papandreou's policies
TWO AND A HALF MILLION wage earners in the public and private sectors paralyzed Greece on January 15. A massive reaction against building companies hit by a decline in orders from the Arab countries in the wake of falling oil prices.
At the same time, measures were taken recognizing civil marriage, divorce by mutual consent and equality between the sexes at work. Nonetheless, PASOK held back a project for lifting the ban on abortion opposed by the ultra-conservative Greek Orthodox Church. However, hundreds of thousands of backstreet abortions are carried out every year, and 25 per cent of young women under 20 have had between one and seven abortions.
In dealing with a state machine the PASOK government's austerity strike the country has experienced 1974. JEAN-JACQUES LAREDO
You get some idea of the breadth and scope of this action when you remember that the total economically active population is 6.4 million, of whom a little under 3 million are wage earners.
This strike surpassed the one on November 14, 1985, at the height of the movement sparked by the introduction of Andreas Papandreou's austerity plan. It confirms the growing opposition to the economic orientations of the [PASOK] team that came to power in 1981.
When Andreas Papandreou's PASOK party won a clear victory in the legislative elections over the New Democracy, the right-wing party that had ruled the country since 1974, it had only been in existence for seven years. Its program continues to be distinguished by a sometimes vague populism.
Inflation in Greece is around 25%, and the rural exodus grows daily (DR) 10 policy, it was the biggest general since the fall of the colonels in
The two first years of the PASOK majority were marked by a policy of economic revival through increasing consumption, restructuring of agriculture in order to boost production and through modernizing the industrial plants. Parallel to this, in 1981 and 1982 a series of reforms were introduced that improved the situation of the most disadvantaged.
A sliding scale of wages was established. Low wages and pensions were raised. A month's paid vacation for everyone was instituted and a national health system was set up.
PASOK refused to undertake an extensive program of nationalizations. When it carried out nationalizations, it did so in faltering industries, under pressure from the workers. Such measures were applied to shipyards belonging to the fabulously wealthy shipbuilder Niarchos and to some that became clogged with rust during the dark years of the dictatorship, Papandreou chose to tread softly. On the one hand, he liquidated the legal heritage of the dictatorship, abolishing the emergency laws that had been kept on the books since 1974 by Karamanlis governments. On the other, he doubled the salaries of the ordinary and special police, while reducing their workweek from 44 to 37 hours.
Very rapidly the PASOK found itself facing a difficult economic situation. Greece continues to be dependent on foreign capital and technology. The World Bank even classes it in the category of countries with intermediate incomes that export manufactured products (along with Brazil, the Philippines and Portugal). Its per capita GNP falls between that of Israel and Venezuela.
Andreas Papandreou took the reins of power after the entry of Greece into the EEC on January 1, 1980. The effects of Common Market membership have proved negative for Greek agriculture. After the removal of protectionist measures, EEC products penetrated the Greek market to the detriment of other market to the detriment of other imports. But Greek products did not find an opening on EEC markets. Massive agricultural trading deficit
The production costs and quality of Greek products were not up to EEC standards. With Greece's entry into the EEC, its agriculture trading balance went from the black into the red. Today this deficit has grown to 3,000 million US dollars per year.
Unemployment and the exodus from the land have increased. About two-thirds of the 10 million Greeks lived in the greater Athens area. Alongside the classical industries, there is an informal economy. For 1985, it is estimated that invisible receipts" amounted to 1,300 million dollars, coming from such sources as unregistered housing of tourists.
International Viewpoint 9 February 1987
The policies of the first two years of the PASOK majority were largely financed by loans from foreign banks, building up 15,000 million dollars in foreign debt. Moreover, while Greece has not resorted to borrowing from the IMF, it has not managed to escape from the guidelines it has laid down.
Priority is given to fighting inflation (which continues to hover around 25 per cent per year), reducing the budget deficit by cutting public spending and by cutting wages. At the same time, direct taxes have risen by 50 per cent and indirect ones by 25 per cent.
But PASOK has taken advantage of a vacuum on the political scene. The New Democracy [PASOK's principal electoral rival] is seen for what it is, the party of the authoritarian and anti-social right.
The memory of its years in office and the compromises of some of its members with the dictatorship still weigh heavily. Moreover, the right is still marked by what it did during the bloody civil war that wracked the country between 1945 and 1949, when the British and their proteges finally crushed the Greek revolution, with Stalin's blessing.
The Greek Communist Party is split. The so-called Interior wing, premature Eurocommunists, have taken their distance from Moscow. But the Exterior wing remains hitched to Moscow's policy, and it is by far the larger of the two, although it does not have the strength seriously to challenge PASOK on the electoral level. The pressure of the electoral system still operates in favor of PASOK.
For example, PASOK has control of the national confederation of labor (GSEE), which has no credible opposition to its left. This enabled Papandreou to call snap legislative elections in 1985 and win an absolute majority of the seats.
In October of the same year, Papandreou announced his austerity plan - a 15 per cent devaluation of the currency, a freeze on wages and dismantling of the sliding scale of wages [cost-of-living allowances ]. The workers' counter-attack then was massive and touched off a crisis in the trade-union movement.
The unions led by the two Communist Parties launched a series of strikes. On October 29, the GSEE Council took an irreversible step. By a vote of 27 to 18, it decided to remove its president, G Rastopoulos, a supporter of Papandreou's policy, and called a general strike in November.
The PASOK reacted in its usual authoritarian way. The seven PASOK members who had voted with the Communists were expelled. A split occurred when PASOK members loyal to the government took the conflict to the courts, accusing the GSEE Council of having taken an illegal decision.
The rejection of PASOK's policy was demonstrated in the municipal elections in October. Three of the four main city governments - Athens, Piraeus and Salonica - were won by the New Democracy. The Communist Party called for a vote to punish PASOK. It being against the law not to vote, the number of blank ballots reached 25 per cent.