The strike of the Larnaca port workers of the Kition Ocean Port company continues for the second day today, which started yesterday Monday, after the rejection of the proposal of the Ministry of Labor and Social Insurance, on the part of the company.
According to the SEK and PEO Trade Unions “the proposal of the Ministry of Labour, which was submitted yesterday, concerned the suspension of layoffs and the subsequent withdrawal of strike measures by the employees, so that a meeting could be held today, Tuesday, at the Office of the Director of the Mediation Service” .
The labor side, it is added, “responded immediately and positively to the proposal of the Ministry of Labor, however the company's response was negative”.
It is recalled that in yesterday's announcement by the SEGDAMELIN-PEO and OMEPEGE-SEK Trade Unions, it is stated that “while the process of negotiating and concluding a Collective Labor Agreement (CBA) based on the Industrial Relations Code is pending and requests have been submitted and the process is open to the Department of Labor Relations, the Kition Ocean Port company in the Port of Larnaca does not agree to continue negotiations”.
It is added that the company has already carried out two “retaliatory” as it describes “dismissals ignoring and circumventing both the Industrial Relations Code and legislation protecting Trade Union freedoms. The workers are reacting collectively to protect their rights, the right to organize, Collective Bargaining and Collective Bargaining”.
According to the announcement, “the challenge is greater because this attitude develops in an area where the company manages public property. All the strikers are asking is for the retaliatory dismissals to be revoked immediately and for a collective bargaining agreement negotiation process to begin on the basis of the requests that have already been sent by them and their Unions”.
Furthermore, in her own statement the Kition Ocean Port company reports that on Monday, February 6 “without warning and without information, a small group of crane operators at the port, irregularly decided to proceed with a work stoppage, refusing to perform their prescribed work”.
It adds that “last week two employees refused to perform the tasks required to carry out their daily work during the arrival of a certain ship”.
According to the company, in the last months, it took care of the specialized training them and “nevertheless, they refused to perform what was requested, as provided for in their signed contract”. He claims that the workers “used the claim that this is not part of their duties, which is not the case” and states that “the result of this irregular movement was the dismissal of the duties of the two crane operators”.
Kition Ocean Port also states in its announcement that it “approached the issue from the very beginning with a spirit of cooperation. Despite the fact that the attitude was considered “absurd”, the general approach and the position of the specific employees remained negative, in no case did this move by the company have a vindictive character or any intention”.
