THE Government said yesterday it was losing patience with striking truck drivers, who are refusing to budge from their blockade of the island’s ports, now into its sixth day.
Private business associations estimate that if the strike continues into next week, it will cost the economy £10 million per day.
It has already cost over £25 million since the island’s two ports at Limassol and Larnaca have effectively been closed since Monday, they said.
Pleading with the truckers yesterday, Agriculture Minister Fotis Fotiou said foreign importers were already looking abroad because of the ongoing crisis and that the island was losing money fast.
“This situation cannot continue,” said Fotiou. “Today, I heard the cries of help from the farmers themselves and I can honestly tell you that the current situation has reached tragic proportions.”
On Thursday, farmers blockaded the Paphos-Limassol motorway in protest at the strikers’ actions. The truckers eventually agreed to allow through some perishable goods, with four tons of citrus fruit allowed into the port to be loaded for export.
Justice Minister Sophocles Sophocleous told reporters yesterday that “the glass has overflowed”. While the right to strike was sacred, he said, “so is the state’s duty to defend the rights of the public and business who are being affected by the strike”.
“Everything has its limits, its sell-by date, and certainly my patience is being tested,” he warned, adding police would do everything to protect truck drivers seeking to gain access to the ports.
Warning of the economic impact of the dispute, Finance Minister Michalis Sarris said the ministers of agriculture, justice and transport were meeting on whether the police should step in to secure the ports.
“There are consultations to determine where the rights of the strikers end and where the rights of others begin,” he said.
Loucas Demetriou, the representative of the truckers, told state radio the government’s handling of the licensing issue was to blame.
“We are not to blame. This has been going on for three years. We suspended previous strikes and went to negotiate but our problems have still not been solved,” he said.
But Communications Minister Harris Thrassou said the government had no intention of entering talks with the drivers for as long as their protest continued.
“You cannot be part of a dialogue while the other is holding a pistol to your head,” the minister said.
On Thursday, holders of A and D professional licences decided to extend their strike action for another 48 hours. The truckers are claiming that the Licensing Authority continues to issue class C licenses to private companies to serve their businesses to the detriment of professional truck drivers. By law, class C licenses should only be issued to specially designated vehicles in special cases, but according to the truckers anyone with a truck is being issued one.
Thrassou yesterday told the truckers they were wasting their time, insisting he did not have the right to call for the withdrawal of C licences because the License Authority was independent and evaluates the evidence for handing out licences on its own.
President Tassos Papadopoulos told reporters that his government was not trying to fool the truck drivers.
“Some of the demands were from the start impossible to meet. That doesn’t mean that they are being fooled simply because we told them that the law, the constitution and the interest of all parties does not allow the demands they want.”
The President echoed his justice minister, saying “the law protects the sacred right to strike” but that the rights of the public’s free movement must also be protected.
