Employees of the north’s Koop Bank and its subsidiaries who went on strike after not being paid their salaries for the month of July on Tuesday broke into the bank’s headquarters in northern Nicosia.

According to newspaper Yeniduzen, workers stormed the bank’s headquarters and reached as far as the general manager’s office, with general manager Kemal Ataman then reportedly fleeing,

The workers were, according to the newspaper, demanding that the bank’s management resign, though Ataman was less than impressed at the measures taken by workers to show their displeasure.

“I filed a police complaint against those who raided my office, broke the door, and caused the ceiling to collapse … No one has the right to raid, kick, or destroy a place,” he told Yeniduzen.

He added that he has been “working for weeks to get these salaries paid”, and that they would be paid on Wednesday.

Part of the ceiling hanging by a wire in Koop Bank general manager Kemal Ataman’s office [Photo: Yeniduzen]

Koop Bank is one of the largest employers in the north, and as well as a bank, operates Seker Insurance, dairy company Koop Sut, and the Binboga animal feed factory, among other companies.

Striking workers on Thursday gathered outside the Koop Bank headquarters, with trade union Ktams leader Guven Bengihan making a speech.

“This problem has been caused by managers not fulfilling their duties. They are telling these people to accept death and malaria. You are supposed to work and then pay for it. This is unacceptable,” he said.

The promise that salaries would be paid on Wednesday was repeated in a statement made by ‘deputy prime minister’ Fikri Ataoglu’s office, though many workers remained unconvinced, with fellow trade union Koop-Sen leader Mehmetali Guroz saying that he had not been invited to any meetings to discuss the matter.

As such, he said, the strike will continue into Wednesday, with demonstrators invited to protest outside ‘prime minister’ Unal Ustel’s office.

He later told Yeniduzen that workers would gather outside Ustel’s office at 8am, and that now the strike has been called on it will not end until a reported eight-item list of austerity measures imposed on Koop workers by the ruling coalition is formally withdrawn.

Those eight items include that those receiving a pension stop work, the 13th salary be abolished, the cost-of-living allowance (CoLA) not be paid, and that Eid bonuses be cut in half.

“We have not even discussed what is being imposed on us through those austerity measures. The strike will end when the eight-article imposition is withdrawn,” Guroz said.

Koop-Sen leader Mehmetali Guroz making a speech outside the bank’s headquarters