UPDATE: Greek Seamen Federation decided not to proceed to further strikes, and sea transport will resume on Wednesday, March 21st 2012, at 6 a.m, when the 48-hour strike ends. (Further reading)

On March 18/2012 KTG reported: Greek seamen will launch several 48-hour strikes starting on March 19th 2012. The NAtional Maritime Federation decided so on Friday in order to protest their pensions cuts, but also the incorporation of their social security fund NAT at the new social security and health care organisation EOPPY. The federation also demands that the NAT will remain independent within the EOPPY and that the Collective Labour Agreement for 2012 will be signed.

Pensioners at NAT have suffered severe cuts up to 500-600 euro per month.

Under the latest Troika dictations, collective bargain agreements have been almost cancelled with the effect that salaries and wages can be sharply decreased with enforced private agreements between employers and employees.

Long lasting seamen strikes will have a catastrophic impact on the transportation of goods to and from the Greek islands. Not to mention the impact on the tourism.

Several bodies, among them farmers from Crete and the Chamber of Commerce of the Cyclades, have sent letter to NMF, the ministers of Development and Citizens’ Protection seeking to find a compromise in order to avoid “to impede the transfer of goods, as this would inevitably cause enormous economic damage.”

This post would be eventually updated if there is some development on the issue…