1 00:00:22,949 --> 00:00:26,304 When I wake up in the morning, I light a cigarette, I drink a cup of coffee. 2 00:00:27,320 --> 00:00:29,265 Before that I’ll wash myself… 3 00:00:30,591 --> 00:00:33,871 My colleagues are usually here and we chat 4 00:00:34,636 --> 00:00:38,883 Then the night will come again, I'll go inside the tent to sleep, then wake up 5 00:00:39,198 --> 00:00:40,607 and do the same things once again. 6 00:00:40,639 --> 00:00:46,731 I don’t like it but it’s imperative that we resist. 7 00:00:47,064 --> 00:00:49,961 Because the company asked us to commit suicide. 8 00:00:50,536 --> 00:00:52,808 We won’t commit suicide. We'd rather have the company kill us. 9 00:00:53,341 --> 00:00:56,965 Me, I come and sleep over here since the second day of my layoff. 10 00:00:57,466 --> 00:01:02,216 I placed this tent here and said that I’ll sleep here until they take me back. 11 00:01:03,704 --> 00:01:06,320 Days of Strike 12 00:01:07,409 --> 00:01:11,777 A month before the first layoffs, among which there’s mine too, 13 00:01:12,891 --> 00:01:17,816 the company announced that, starting November 1st, 14 00:01:18,430 --> 00:01:24,990 either we accept a 5hrs work shift, 5 days a week or they’ll fire 180 people. 15 00:01:25,367 --> 00:01:32,329 273 people unanimously decided not to accept this measure 16 00:01:37,393 --> 00:01:43,799 and, if Mr. Manesis would proceed in the layoffs, we’d get in the streets for action. 17 00:01:44,504 --> 00:01:47,504 Nikolaos Manesis is the owner of Halyvourgia Ellados steel industry. 18 00:01:47,799 --> 00:01:50,577 The reason he invoked for the changes in the working status quo were 19 00:01:50,814 --> 00:01:52,673 the financial crisis and the company’s losses during the past two years. 20 00:01:53,472 --> 00:02:03,212 We told him that production has gone up by 70.000 tons from 2009 to 2011 21 00:02:03,873 --> 00:02:11,015 which means that we have intensified our work and we can’t know if there is any crisis. 22 00:02:11,221 --> 00:02:14,234 There is a lot of production indeed. A day before the factory closed 23 00:02:14,734 --> 00:02:18,322 there were departments which were working for 14 and 16 hours to produce iron. 24 00:02:22,030 --> 00:02:26,246 We haven’t taken our holidays because of the intense production. There was no time. 25 00:02:26,837 --> 00:02:29,590 Don’t listen to them when they say that there is no production. 26 00:02:30,235 --> 00:02:33,048 The projects are about to start, Mr. Manesis himself told us. 27 00:02:33,449 --> 00:02:35,709 Halyvourgia Ellados has two factories, in Aspropyrgos and in Volos. 28 00:02:35,710 --> 00:02:38,127 The Volos trade union immediately accepted the company’s demands. 29 00:02:38,127 --> 00:02:40,634 In Aspropyrgos the workers denied and, initially, 24 people were fired. 30 00:02:40,635 --> 00:02:44,271 The workers decided to strike indefinitely. By early December the layoffs rose to 50. 31 00:02:44,771 --> 00:02:47,008 The mobilization continued. 32 00:02:53,758 --> 00:02:56,034 Honestly, I’ve never participated in a demonstration before. 33 00:02:57,175 --> 00:03:02,860 The people there were great. From wherever we’d pass they’d tell us: 34 00:03:03,022 --> 00:03:12,582 “Have courage! Hang on! Stay put! You are the bastion against the storm that is coming 35 00:03:13,050 --> 00:03:16,106 to affect the amount of working hours”. 36 00:03:19,282 --> 00:03:25,436 This strike has a special characteristic that older labor struggles had too. 37 00:03:25,796 --> 00:03:30,592 These struggles had a sense of heroism, a strong solidarity between the workers 38 00:03:31,000 --> 00:03:33,640 and a militancy which gives the impression that they can reach the extremes, 39 00:03:33,960 --> 00:03:35,441 that they won’t abate. 40 00:03:35,838 --> 00:03:41,712 And together with issues of salaries and working conditions, there is also a strong sense of dignity. 41 00:03:42,179 --> 00:03:44,433 We are not heroes, we were not born as heroes. 42 00:03:44,473 --> 00:03:45,961 We are not heroes, as the people say. 43 00:03:46,199 --> 00:03:52,397 What we don’t negotiate is what our “predecessor workers”, so to say, have inherited to us. 44 00:03:52,538 --> 00:03:56,927 There was a lot of blood spilled for the 8 hours day and the 5 days working week. 45 00:03:57,049 --> 00:03:58,615 These can’t be undone by us. 46 00:04:04,760 --> 00:04:11,063 If these measures pass from the steel worker, what will the employers say to a shop employee? 47 00:04:11,340 --> 00:04:15,838 Will they earn the same? The employer will say “the guys who manufacture the iron earn 700 euros. 48 00:04:15,967 --> 00:04:18,728 How much can you demand for simply carrying it?” 49 00:04:18,821 --> 00:04:25,522 Mr. Manesis is probably something like a forerunner for the rest of the industrialists. 50 00:04:26,560 --> 00:04:32,982 Something like the beginning for what is going to happen in the rest of the country. 51 00:04:33,961 --> 00:04:42,095 And this is more obvious when you see the solidarity we get from people who come 52 00:04:42,370 --> 00:04:50,747 and brings food, money, cigarettes, they come and show their support with deeds. 53 00:04:51,810 --> 00:04:57,369 And everyone says “Stay put and we’ll support you”. 54 00:04:57,980 --> 00:05:00,891 It’s unethical not to fight. It’s unethical. 55 00:05:04,454 --> 00:05:08,394 Today, while a charity gala can be covered by three cameras and can occupy 56 00:05:08,524 --> 00:05:13,214 a 5 or 10 minutes news item on TV, this strike did not have the tv and radio coverage 57 00:05:13,598 --> 00:05:15,759 in proportion to its importance. 58 00:05:16,283 --> 00:05:21,555 Of course the media have played a very crucial role for what we are living. 59 00:05:21,704 --> 00:05:28,344 They tried hard to impose this situation onto large social groups as an inevitable one. 60 00:05:28,473 --> 00:05:32,295 Additionally, they tried hard to collectively inculpate the society. 61 00:05:32,420 --> 00:05:39,963 A basic tactic to do this, in order to achieve the goal of manipulating the collective conscience, 62 00:05:40,086 --> 00:05:43,853 is the concealment or the falsification of events. 63 00:05:43,987 --> 00:05:46,617 Who else has ever done a strike for 32 days in Greece? 64 00:05:46,747 --> 00:05:51,028 Noone has ever done it. 32 consecutive days of strike? 65 00:05:52,812 --> 00:05:59,955 There is so many people coming here for solidarity and there is not a single TV station. 66 00:06:00,752 --> 00:06:04,110 In the labor struggles they usually prefer the tactic of concealment. 67 00:06:04,199 --> 00:06:09,264 For example, during these two years since the EU/IMF Memorandum there were many labor struggles, 68 00:06:09,317 --> 00:06:11,560 however few of them reached the main news bulletins. 69 00:06:11,723 --> 00:06:18,411 The same thing happens in the case of the steel workers. When their story was first shown on TV, 70 00:06:18,735 --> 00:06:22,903 they were already one month into the strike. And that was on a Saturday… 71 00:06:23,411 --> 00:06:25,709 One other Saturday... 72 00:06:26,745 --> 00:06:28,490 -What do you know about Halyvourgiki? 73 00:06:30,067 --> 00:06:32,210 -Me, nothing. -Blackout? Noone? Nothing? 74 00:06:33,315 --> 00:06:35,629 -They are on strike. They are on strike for several days now. 75 00:06:35,744 --> 00:06:38,321 -Great! Can you inform me as well so that I understand what happened? 76 00:06:38,461 --> 00:06:40,074 -They are on strike for several days. What do you want? 77 00:06:41,459 --> 00:06:45,814 It was a random moment when I felt awkward and wanted to change the subject and 78 00:06:45,940 --> 00:06:50,322 since I know the guys, I tried to bring into the discussion an issue which 79 00:06:50,459 --> 00:06:54,819 I would indeed be very interested to discuss. Since I knew it was not well known, 80 00:06:55,904 --> 00:07:03,555 I wanted to discuss it because I think people would be interested to hear about it. 81 00:07:08,894 --> 00:07:12,492 From their reaction, I understood that there was some kind of embarrassment. 82 00:07:15,122 --> 00:07:22,522 We can’t hope that every day this story is top news in the channels which we know 83 00:07:22,889 --> 00:07:27,281 more or less how they function. 84 00:07:27,903 --> 00:07:32,699 I mean, to make it into the new bulletins, a news story must first not touch on the channel’s interests 85 00:07:32,774 --> 00:07:36,282 and second it must be catchy. 86 00:07:37,610 --> 00:07:42,769 Now, I can’t know what sort of interests there are so that this news story is not 87 00:07:42,954 --> 00:07:50,282 top news continuously. For sure it’s probably not very nice for the industrialists 88 00:07:50,992 --> 00:07:56,428 or those who have certain interests, to see a strike as a top news story. 89 00:08:08,935 --> 00:08:12,555 I’m here in downtown Athens for the third week. 90 00:08:12,783 --> 00:08:17,685 We have started a solidarity action for the steel workers at Halyvourgia Ellados. 91 00:08:24,050 --> 00:08:29,074 We collect signatures and money for the strikers and 92 00:08:29,242 --> 00:08:32,918 we also hand out a proclamation of support to their struggle. 93 00:08:41,460 --> 00:08:45,570 We believe that this strike is about all Greeks because the whole of Greek people 94 00:08:45,706 --> 00:08:48,586 today is experiencing an attack from the capital and the state. 95 00:08:49,995 --> 00:08:54,798 For us it’s common sense that the Greek people should support this strike as if it was its own strike. 96 00:08:55,149 --> 00:09:03,735 Because we all are or will be tomorrow in the place where the strikers at Halyvourgia are today. 97 00:09:08,394 --> 00:09:13,010 We are here in order to express our solidarity to the strikers at Halyvourgia Ellados. 98 00:09:13,352 --> 00:09:16,914 The strikers are fighting so that their salary is not reduced to 500 euros and 99 00:09:17,067 --> 00:09:21,102 so that the 50 layoffs are annulled. Their strike concerns all of us. 100 00:09:21,647 --> 00:09:26,932 No one can survive alone in the savage attack from the capital and the state. 101 00:09:27,937 --> 00:09:33,716 We support the strike by signing the text of solidarity. May the strikers at Halyvourgia Ellados win. 102 00:09:33,883 --> 00:09:37,124 If it passes from us, they will trample on you. 103 00:09:37,875 --> 00:09:41,063 We can’t take it any more. It’s either us or them. 104 00:09:41,427 --> 00:09:43,519 Everyone who believes in our struggle is welcome. 105 00:09:43,663 --> 00:09:46,586 But those who truly believe it, in one single struggle.