Speech of the General Secretary of AKEL Andros Kyprianou at the event dedicated to the 70th anniversary of the 1948 Miner’s strike

 

“Kostis Damianos” Amphitheatre, Mitsero village, Nicosia district

AKEL C.C. Press Office, 1 June 2018

An increase of 8 cents to 1,000 workers and 12 to 16 cents to 150 craftsmen. Paid overtime for all workers and workers freed from paying for the value of tools. These three demands were won after a consistent and bloody struggle lasting many days. The miners decided to wage the struggle under the leadership of their trade union, with AKEL, the Popular Municipal Councils and the Mass Organizations of the Left on their side, together with the popular strata who supported them from their meagre wages.

For four months and four days the miners were fighting for the self-evident. They didn’t just have brutal employers against them, but also the leadership of the Church and the right-wing trade union confederation of SEK. They also faced an anti-communism campaign against them aiming at preventing anyone from raising their heads. “My country is spending millions of dollars to fight communism all over the world. It will not think twice about spending a few thousand pounds for the same purpose in Cyprus,” said the General Manager of the Hendrix Mining Company. “Better 12 blue hours, than 8 red hours”, the right-wing leaders and strike-breakers declared.

This little historic reminder now ironically blinks an eye to Mr. Anastasiades’ recent statements about “trade union power estates”. Back then the Right-wing in an alliance with the employers, the foreign and domestic economic oligarchy were accusing the trade unions of threatening the nation and the economy of the country. Mr. Anastasiades more or less in his attempt to load the ideological fixations, impotence and handling of his own government on others, has rebuked trade unionism.

I will only refer to health as an example. The Anastasiades government and ruling forces have left 70% of the population to be served by only 791 doctors, while 2,500 doctors are at the disposal of just 30% of the population. They allocate funds for health amounting to just 2.2% of GDP which in fact is the lowest throughout the European Union. Instead of addressing these problems, with the relevant figures refuting them and reflecting a reality which thousands of people live on a daily basis, they rebuke and criticize trade unionism. It is very regrettable that only the class-based trade union movement of the country, namely the Pancyprian Federation of Labour (PEO), reacted to these insulting references by the President of the Republics.

The real face of each and every one is gradually being revealed. Mr. Anastasiades and the ruling DISY party were criticizing throughout the entire past five years both Christofias and AKEL, the so-called “obsessions” of the Left for granting the Easter allowance for pensioners, the provision of free public transport for school students to go to school and the state’s role in education, health and social policy. In the five year term that has just begun, it’s not so easy for them to continue attacking Christofias and AKEL. Mr. Anastasiades recently ventured to deal with the issues relating to Cooperatives, but we reminded him that his Government assumed full responsibility of Cooperatives five years ago. Therefore, he has to look in the mirror when he is looking for the culprits regarding the situation Cooperatives have ended up in. Besides, the Left has not even had one of its own cadres in the leadership of the Co-operative Bank. We have to remind Mr. Anastasiades of this fact as well.

The true face of each and every one is gradually being revealed. The policies of the Anastasiades-DISY Government have abolished gains and rights that were won through fierce bloody struggles. The challenge for us is step by step through organization and struggle to win them back. Our challenge is not to glorify our magnificent History, but to write our own new History. Woe betide, if now when we need to rally forces, organize and struggle we are beaten by defeatism and fatalism. Now is the time to stand up and be counted, to resist.  Now is the time devote all our energies and efforts to win the future; to give hope to working people again for a better life.

Tonight we pay tribute to our veteran miners. It is an honor for us to honor them because by doing so we honor our History too, our perspective and vision we are fighting for. No matter how much the ruling narrative attempts to silence it, the People’s Movement of the Left broke the shackles; it showed the way for people to struggle for both big and small problems.

It was and is working in practice, as the Party of all Cypriots. Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots, Maronites, Latins and Armenians.

It struggled and made bloody sacrifices to win an 8-hour working day, social insurance, health care and those 8 cents for a better life.

It opened up a whole new world for the people of labour and toil, with the formation of the Movement of Local Educational and Cultural Associations and Clubs, when the theatre and books were privileges enjoyed only by the rich and privileged.

It gave the people of culture a platform and projected the importance of the letters and arts to the forefront of the struggle for the future.

It showed the way to women, back then when for a woman to become politicized meant going out of the kitchen and thus considered scandalous.

It organized young people to assert their future, the farmers for their labor and toil.

All of these developments have assigned us with a dual responsibility as regards our role as a Popular Movement. Even more so when our country’s young people are working for 700 euros a month, with personal contracts, without rights and any prospects for the future; when job security has been undermined as a result of the government’s political responsibility; when accidents at work have become a part of everyday life, with working people mourning victims trying to make ends meet; when young people today cannot build their lives and are trapped earning meagre wages, in a miserable life; when the future has nothing to promise them today.

Furthermore, the Cyprus problem is being led into dangerous paths due to Turkish intransigence, but also Mr. Anastasiades’ inadequate handlings. The President must at long last stop sacrificing the solution of the Cyprus problem to serve his own considerations; stop believing that he can deceive everyone and stop sacrificing everything for the sake of the seat of power and privileges.

How is it possible for the Greek Cypriot side to have the just cause on its side and to find itself in a corner because of Mr. Anastasiades’ contradictions and fear of assuming his responsibilities?

It is inconceivable for partition to be knocking at the door and instead of taking immediate action, the government to insist on the monologue. Mr. Anastasiades has to clarify his position and seek to resume negotiations on the basis of the Guterres framework and to abandon his communication tricks. They believe they are marginalizing AKEL with erroneous “arguments” of the type “AKEL should tell us if it accepts guarantees, we don’t accept them”.

But aren’t they forgetting the fact that it was Anastasiades who was the first one to accept guarantees in 2004?

Aren’t they forgetting that Christofias was the first to raise the issue of the abolition of guarantees at the negotiating table?

They pretend they don’t hear or understand what the UN Secretary-General said in his Report or what the Turkish Cypriot side is saying. The Government and the ruling DISY party are insisting on their own narrative for internal consumption purposes, culminating in all the talk about reunification at the end of Mr. Anastasiades’ term, reunification in 2030 and much more. We won’t permit them to bury Cyprus’ perspective.

We will persist in reminding them of their responsibility: either we will manage to reunite Cyprus with a bi-zonal bicommunal federal solution, or this time the Right-wing of the country will irreparably damage Cyprus.

Every day that passes with the Cyprus problem unsolved, imperialism’s goal, which ordered the execution of the twin crime committed in 1974, is fulfilled.

Every day that passes with the Cyprus problem unsolved vindicates all those forces and circles in both communities that poisoned and are poisoning our people with nationalism and chauvinism.

Each day that goes by the consequences of the invasion and occupation are being consolidated.

As AKEL we will continue to struggle for the solution of the Cyprus problem; a solution that will terminate the occupation and colonialization; a solution based on UN Resolutions, the High-Level Agreements, International and European Law; a solution that will demilitarize Cyprus and exclude interventions and guarantees from foreign powers; a solution that will reunite the land, the people, the institutions and the economy; a bi-communal, bizonal federal solution with political equality as described in United Nations texts; a solution that will lead to a united state as a continuation of the Republic of Cyprus with a single sovereignty, a single international personality and a single citizenship.

We therefore have as a Party a lot of work to do at all levels: in the struggle for peace and our country’s reunification, in the struggle for rapprochement, the isolation of neo-fascism, the raising of working people’s standard of living and the protection and strengthening of their rights, as well as the development and prosperity for the many.

From this place we have gathered here today which is full of history, watered with blood, heaped in glory by the miners’ sacrifices, from here, we assure our veterans, we look our young people in the eye and redouble our determination: we insist and we shall insist on waging the struggle for peace, reunification and social justice until the final victory!