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Striking Nicosia bus employees march to ministries (video) (update 3)

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Photo Christos Theodorides

Vowing to continue their strike, Nicosia bus company employees marched to the transport and labour ministries on Wednesday, a day after they voted by 99 votes to 84 to continue industrial action they started on Friday.

At the ministries, they handed over petitions outlining the problems they say need to be addressed. Their trade unions said they were continuing their strike ‘united’ and would hold a new meeting at the Peo trade union confederation headquarters in the capital on Thursday.

Their Larnaca counterparts had called off their strike on Tuesday, held talks with government officials and the company during which an initial agreement was hammered out.

The labour ministry has said it is ready to mediate in the dispute at the Nicosia company, but only once strike action has been suspended.

And speaking in Xylophagou, Transport Minister Yiannis Karousos appealed to the strikers to end their industrial action so that talks can start to resolve the dispute.

He thanked the unions, employees, and bus company in Larnaca who had sat down around the table and found solutions to their issues.  As to Nicosia he said: “Unfortunately, yesterday it was decided to continue the strike. If Nicosia had decided to end the strike and were with us last night in the talks, their problems would have been resolved too.”

Employees in both towns had gone on strike on Friday after 36 colleagues were given dismissal letters. These were then revoked, with Larnaca employees agreeing to return to work and to enter into talks over other long-standing problems, but their Nicosia counterparts refusing to do so.

Athos Eleftheriou, head of the transport section of Peo trade union confederation, told state radio on Wednesday they were waiting for the final text of the agreement reached for Larnaca but added that similar agreements had been reached in the past but not implemented.

Nicosia personnel were waiting for the resolution of the problems they face.

 

In an announcement, the unions apologised for the inconvenience caused to passengers, but said this was not their fault. And they reiterated their willingness to negotiate the soonest possible in good faith to resolve the problems and avoid similar disputes in the future.

In lengthy letters to the two ministers, the employees set out their grievances that include pressing working hours, short breaks, lack of facilities such as bathrooms where they are given longer breaks and tachographs that appear not to be working. They said drivers’ timesheets should cover hours at work, not behind the wheel, adding that for safety reasons, the company should not use women drivers late at night.

On Tuesday, representatives of Peo and Sek trade union confederations had appealed to the ministers of labour and transport to press ahead with initiatives to resolve the industrial dispute, even though strike action was continuing.

They said the ministry was aware of the problems, and that despite promises given in 2020 after a strike, action to address them had not been taken.

Workers’ representatives said there are many important problems, including issues of safety, health, legislation, long hours, lack of adequate breaks and infrastructure.

On Monday Cyprus Public Transport (CPT) apologised to the public for the disturbance caused by the “unannounced strike” of bus drivers in Nicosia and Larnaca.

In a new statement on Wednesday afternoon, the company once again expressed its sincere apologies to the passengers suffering the effects of the ongoing strike in Nicosia.

“Yesterday, following the termination of the strike by the Unions in Larnaca, CPT met with the employees and the Unions in the presence of the Minister of Transport, Communications and Works and the Minister of Labour, Welfare and Social Insurance and by the end of the day we reached a common agreement taking into consideration all of their demands,” it said.

” Unfortunately, in Nicosia the Unions are still continuing the strike.  Nonetheless the Company wishes to resolve the dispute the soonest and we reiterate our proposal of solutions as we did last Saturday,” the announcement concluded.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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