AKEL on Worker’s May Day
AKEL at the forefront of the struggle for working people’s rights
A Strong AKEL for a Strong Society
AKEL issues a call for unity, struggle, and strengthening the voice of working people in the upcoming elections
140 years after the bloody suppression of the May Day uprising of Chicago’s workers, the messages of that uprising remain alive and timeless, uniting and inspiring millions of working people around the world to this very day.
Today we pay tribute to the heroic martyrs of Chicago, the shining symbol of the working class’s struggle all over the world against capitalist exploitation. We honor the struggles and sacrifices of the working class around the world.
We honor the pioneering Cypriot workers, both Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot, who, under conditions of double oppression—class-based and colonial—laid the foundations of the class-based trade union movement in our country and opened up new paths for working people. The strikes of miners and construction workers, the hard-fought battles for an eight-hour workday, the Automatic Cost of Living Allowance (COLA), and collective bargaining agreements, serve as a reminder that nothing is ever granted—everything is won through struggle, unity, and solidarity.
Workers May Day is not just a day of remembrance and honor. It is also a springboard for struggle and assertions for the present and future of working people. Struggles and assertions for those who produce the country’s wealth on construction sites, in the retail sector, in hotels, in the services industry, and in offices. For the young people that are hired on contracts, with curbed rights, on meagre wages. For the veterans of the labour force who, through their hard work, built Cyprus on the ruins of 1974.
AKEL has been and remains the leading force in the struggles, on the side and together with the trade union movement, for the protection of workers, for the expansion of their rights, and for the support of society.
We continue to fight against expensiveness, rising prices, for the effective protection of low-wage earners from the ongoing erosion of their purchasing power, for a minimum wage that meets the cost of living, for the expansion and consolidation of collective bargaining agreements, the extension of the COLA to all working people in the country, and for the abolition of the 12% penalty on pensions.
We continue the struggle to ensure the safety and health of workers, to defend the social character of the National Health System (GESY). For a modern social policy that supports young parents and a housing policy that covers those who are truly in need. To shield the labour force from deregulation and precariousness and ensure dignified working conditions for all, especially young workers who are often in a more vulnerable position. Economic growth must translate into improved living standards for those who drive the economy: namely, the workers.
This year’s May Day coincides with the upcoming battle of the May parliamentary elections, a critical battle for the future of our country. AKEL calls on the people of the Left, every progressive Cypriot person, to ensure through their participation and vote on 24th May that our country will continue to have a decisive and powerful force defending society and our homeland: a strong and leading force AKEL, a force of resistance against big business interests and the establishment. A force of struggle so that society may regain its dignity!
On the occasion of Worker’s May Day, AKEL extends a message of struggle and unity to the entire working class, to all the working people of Cyprus—Greek Cypriots, Turkish Cypriots, Maronites, Armenians, Latins, and immigrants working in our country, and calls for a mass participation in tomorrow’s May Day demonstrations organized by the Pancyprian Federation of Labour (PEO) in all cities.
Long live Worker’s May Day!
