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Victoria Mindova

Summers in the Balkans have always been hot, but they are infernally hot in Greece lately. In addition to the high temperatures that vary between 38 and 40 degrees in the shade, strikes, protests and blockades are inseparable part of the Greek reality. Today's economic crisis has revealed that behind the mask of apparent democracy, there hides a group of people in every sector of the economy in Greece, which believes that the country belongs to them.

An example is our experience a year ago when the government decided to abolish the minimum number of licenses for drivers of trucks and containers for public use. Their number was limited to 30,000 in 1972 by law and met the needs of the time. The population at that time was a few million less, there was not anything like globalization and "imported goods from China" sounded like a short joke.

In 2010, however, the country's needs are different. The level of services, however, remained unchanged and so did the number of the employed in the sector – it is the same as 40 years ago. Consumption has not complied with these restrictions and continued to grow.

While the government was wondering why the country was dying, the experts from the supervisory Troika of the International Monetary Fund, the European Central Bank and the European Commission had an idea. "Probably because you left the key sectors of the economy to be managed by a minimum number of people and monopolies have formed!"

The government tried to introduce a law that would exempt the economy of the habits familiar in the former Soviet Union and its satellites. The law was inconclusive and ineffective, but it made the masses of professionals angry. The result was a blockade of all major public and commercial facilities and strikes to the end. Ports, airports, urban roads, national and international highways were blocked as a war at breaks, for more than two months.

Then, pharmacists and physicians, and workers in the electric company did the same as well as the civil servants, more frequently and according to their abilities.

In the mean time, tormented foreigners and locals tried desperately to reach the oasis of a Greek island the travel agency had promised them. However, it was not easy – flights were late, or the public transport was on strike, or disgruntled truck drivers blocked the highways, or ports were under blockade by the dockers, who wanted to work on any ship that landed in Greece.

Citizens, tourists, traders and other incidental victims of the angry strikers were protesting against the paralysis of the country, but quietly and under their breath. It was not for any other reason but because any criticism of the "truthful struggle of the oppressed" could cause their serious anger. Nobody wants to wake the mafia syndrome in ordinary professionals who may dawn tomorrow to your door and not with good intentions.

This summer it was the turn of taxi owners.

The government gave the green light to the liberalization of the market and decided to remove the restrictions on the minimum number of taxis in the cities. The owners of licenses got angry, "You can not do this! There will be and other drivers. They will take our bread! Strike!" Hired drivers who worked for them until yesterday were glad, "Bravo! Remove the restriction on the licenses and we will be able to get a car too. We will work for ourselves!"

However, the idea of ​​increasing the competitiveness of the market scares the members of various professional associations, including taxi owners. Moreover, the owners of taxi licenses still exceed the number of ordinary drivers.

To show their strength and to prove that the market liberalization does not depend on the government but on their good will, taxi owners blocked the road to the Athens airport Eleftherios Venizelos on Thursday for several hours in the morning. Then, their colleagues blocked the Rio Bridge to Corinth, and the national highway Corinth-Patras to the Peloponnese Peninsula. The national highway that connects Athens to Thessaloniki at Tembi was blocked at about 12 at noon.

The guests and citizens of Crete also faced the angry taxi drivers, who occupied the airport Nikos Kazandzkis in Heraklion and the ports on the island. As result of the activity of the fighters for exclusive possession of a taxi license, tourist buses could not reach the port. There hundreds of foreign tourists waited for them, who are willing to spend their annual savings on the island, but have to walk several kilometers with their luggage to get on an air-conditioned bus.

Other ports that were held hostage by the owners of taxi licenses were Zakinto, Lefkada, Preveza, Corfu, Amfilihiya and Vonitsa. Other colleagues of theirs joined the movement "I do not pay" and blocked the toll desks around Athens and Tripoli.

The Association of Tourist Enterprises issued a formal letter to the chief prosecutor of the country. It called on the authorities to respond to the constant blockades and establish order. It even implied that there could be an apparent impunity and tolerance of extreme protest events.

Tougher was the tone of the President of the Union of Passenger Ship Owners Nikos Kavaliero. He did not deny that certain occupational groups have the right to democratic protests in some cases, but not at the expense of the tourists at the ports. "This can not continue like this - the truck drivers have a problem and stop the movement of passenger ships, then the dockers oppose the cruises and maritime passenger transport stops again. Then, there is a general strike of civil servants and the ports are blocked again. Now taxi drivers are unhappy and passenger ships can not make their courses again. There should be order."