Athens: All Quiet at Protest Front – Masses Stayed Away

The march protest concluded peacefully in downtown Athens and Greek police is opened the traffic to vehicles and the two downtown metro stations as unionist and political party members slowly went home. According to Greek police the protest march participants were some 20,000. Public sector union ADEDY and private sector GSEE had called for a general strike and a march towards the Greke Parliament to protest the austerity measures.

Protesters with banners and slogans expressed their anger about the austerity measures, that seem to find no end in Greece.

After the march was over, a group of “unknown individuals” apparently hurled some 10 Molotov cocktail bombs against a riot police squad near the headquarters of Papandreous’s PASOK. The police fired tear gas in order to get rid of the nenemies.

It is interesting to notice, that the masses of unorganized citizens stayed away from the protest. Have they surrended because the protests proved unable to hinder austerity measures? Possible. Don’t they share the same goals with the civil servants (ADEDY) and the broader state-run enterprises (GSEE)? Apparently not. Are they too depressed to join a protest? Surely. Are they too frustrated and gave up? Possible. Or they just chose to go to work and earn some euros to pay their taxes? Most likely.

Protests tooks place also in other cities across the country without any incidents. Only in Volos, protesters hurled stones against the local office of far-right coalition government partner LAOS.

The next protest is expected to take place on December 6 to commemorate Alexis Grigoropoulos, the 15-year old student who got shot dead by a policeman for no reason. But that won’t be a unions protest.

click to watch video and photos :

http://www.keeptalkinggreece.com/2011/12/01/athens-all-quiet-at-protest-front-strike-dec-1-except-some-tear-gas/