By Athena Karsera
LORDOS Holdings, hoteliers’ associations and the Chamber of commerce and industry yesterday all condemned Thursday’s nationwide hotel strikes.
Staff at many of the island’s hotels took part in the six-hour sympathy strikes, while most hotels claimed to have remained comparatively unaffected by the walk-out.
Unions Sek and Peo called the action in sympathy for marathon strikes at two Larnaca hotels, the Golden Bay and Lordos Beach, both of which belong to Lordos Holdings.
The strikes began on January 31 after 35 employees at the hotel were dismissed when sections of the hotels were turned over to outside contractors.
Lordos Holdings has throughout said that the dismissals were necessary to combat chronic losses at both hotels.
In an announcement yesterday, Lordos Holdings said that while the unions spoke of their own rights, they forgot the rights of other people, “such as the rights of ownership and free use of a property by its owner.”
The management statement said the Company had the right to run its property in “a productive way and to employ those they wish to within the requirements of the law.”
Lordos Holdings said that they also had the right to enjoy the government’s legal protection, “which the unions want to deprive us of with their daily violent and illegal action.”
The statement concluded with management again calling on the unions to submit to binding government arbitration. The unions have so far refused the idea of arbitration unless the dismissed staff are reinstated.
Hoteliers’ association Stek said yesterday that Thursday’s strike and the threat of a two-hour sympathy strike by civil aviation and port workers on Monday, combined with threats against tour operators collaborating with Lordos Holdings, were all actions that would “slander the country’s tourist industry.”
Pasyxe, another Hoteliers’ association, yesterday sent out copies of two letters from Sek and Peo, saying that employees at Larnaca Airport would take part in a two-hour general strike on Monday May 31, starting at 2pm, and that their members would stop offering services to all tour operators sending clients to the Lordos Beach and Golden Bay hotels after May 31.
The Cyprus Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Keve) condemned the unions’ decisions to take further action, and called the unions to take part in binding arbitration. Keve warned the unions they would be responsible for “disastrous results” to the island’s economy because of the strikes.
