Labour Day speeches descend into spat for government and Akel

The result of Akel policies are still fresh in the memory of workers, Government Spokesman Marios Pelekanos said on Sunday in response to charges made by the leader of the left wing party earlier in the day.

He said the policies led to “uncontrolled employment which was essentially annihilated by the [current Disy backed Nicos] Anastasiades government,” that saw young scientists being forced to emigrate and thousands of households resorting to social groceries.

The current government, he added, within a very short time, not only reversed the climate, but also created conditions of unprecedented growth.

“Today we are just one step away from the historic agreement on the minimum wage for workers,” Pelekanos said “and all this despite the fact that the present government had to face not only the scorched earth handed over by Akel but also the unprecedented for world history crisis of the pandemic, and today the consequences of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

“That is why, when the secretary general of Akel talks about the workers, he should know that they are not masses, as Akel likes to characterise them, but citizens with memory and judgment”.

Earlier in the day at an event to mark May 1 organised by left wing union Peo, Akel secretary general Stefanos Stefanou has accused the Disy government of widening the gap between workers and employers and said the country could not stand another five years of such.

“The workers of Cyprus cannot stand another five years of Disy. On the contrary, workers expect a progressive change in local governance. A change that will give way to the current deadlocks. Change in the policies, priorities, style and ethos of governance,” he said.

Disy spokesman Demetris Demetriou said the party did not expect Akel to recognise anything positive in any government policy. “Neither for the institutionalisation of the minimum wage, nor for the increase in maternity leave, nor for the institutionalisation of paternity leave, nor for the guaranteed minimum income, nor even for the General Health System,” he said.