TYCOON businessman Nicos Shacolas has sparked outrage from unions PEO and POVEK by saying he will be seeking special operating hours for his Mall of Cyprus and the new IKEA complex.
Shacolas said he had not officially made a request from the Labour Ministry, but added that the minister would “carefully” review the request once it was made.
This prompted an angry response from a POVEK official, who accused “certain mammoth businesses” of crushing thousands of other businesses.
“The fact that these reports have been made public and been confirmed from the Shacolas Group is something worrying,” said POVEK Permanent Secretary Stefanos Koursaros. “It is being reported that the ministry is welcoming [Shacolas’] needs with regards to the working hours, which includes operation for 365 days a year, including bank holidays and Sundays. As you can imagine, that is something out of the ordinary.”
Koursaros called on the government to deny such a request.
“We are against any such move. We don’t even believe that a meeting should take place on such a request and we especially don’t agree with the positive response that Mr. Shacolas is implying.
“We do not want to make threats, but we are making a warning and we will not stand back and allow the unacceptable demands of certain giant businessmen. It is also not fair to the thousands of other businesses out there that are not as big. We have seen special policies towards big businesses in the past.”
Shacolas said yesterday that introducing extended working hours for IKEA was not a bullying tactic but an operation timetable for all IKEA stores around Europe.
He added that he had not made an official request but would do so soon, adding he had bumped into Labour Minister Antonis Vassiliou recently and discussed the matter with him.
“First of all, no request has been made to the ministry on this matter. I just happened to have a conversation with the minister, who, as you can understand, has to be in favour of the free market… For this particular complex, the operating hours throughout Europe, including Greece, are separate and I told the minister that I will make the request. The minister informed me that he would review the request carefully.”
Vassiliou confirmed yesterday that no official request had been made from the Shacolas group and that there was therefore nothing to discuss.
He added that all sides would be heard should any business make a request for different operating hours.
“POVEK could have contacted me direct if they wanted my response to all this, but anyway, there has not been any request from Mr Shacolas regarding this matter and of course since there has been no request, there is nothing to discuss…The matters concerning operating hours of certain stores come about after discussions from all sides. It is not the intention of the ministry to tip that balance.”
