With Greece’s international lenders still wavering over when to release more loan installments until the government fulfills all previous requirements, Prime Minister Antonis Samaras is pushing his Cabinet ministers to go full speed ahead to make sure everything conforms to the demands.
The Eurozone said on July 24 it would probably decide on July 26 whether to release some 4 billion euros ($5.27 billion) in promised aid but was waiting for Greece to implement a so-called mobility scheme to put 25,000 workers in an involuntary transfer program in which they would be paid 75 percent of their already-reduced salaries for up to eight months and then fired if no other position can be found for them.
First to go will be some 4,200 lower-paid workers who are not in the mobility scheme. That includes teachers, municipal police, school crossing guards, janitors and school nurses, who have been protesting the decision that exempts Parliament workers and middle managers and apparent political hirings. European Union officials are also reportedly upset that Samaras has also made 80 exceptions of workers who will be protected. They were not identified.
Also holding up the works for now is how to handle the case of the 2,656 workers at the national broadcaster ERT who were fired with five minutes notice on June 11 as Samaras shut it down by ministerial decree to appease the Troika of the European Union-International Monetary Fund-European Central Bank (EU-IMF-ECB) and keep aid coming.
It’s uncertain how much severance the workers will be paid and complicating the situation is that as many as 2,000 may be hired temporarily to run an interim station, DT, and 1000-1200 kept to operate a new national broadcaster, NERIT, expected to begin later in the fall.
See all the latest news from Greece and the world at Greekreporter.com. Contact our newsroom to report an update or send your story, photos and videos. Follow GR on Google News and subscribe here to our daily email!
