After an intervention by Greece’s prime minister George Papandreou, who asked for ”the holding of unbiased dialogue” between the government and representatives for Greek taxi owners’ union – the National Taxi Oweners Federation – the latter requested another meeting with Infrastructure and Transport Minister Giannis Ragousis ”to achieve a solution to the problem”. ”Despite the situation created concerning the issues of taxis,” reads the letter sent to the minister,” we consider the prime minister’s speech to his party’s parliamentary group very important. Since we support dialogue, we request an immediate meeting with you to find an unbiased solution.”
Transport Minister Yiannis Ragousis, said he would meet union representatives at 11 a.m. on Friday. Ragousis is also to meet representatives from tour operators and travel agencies to hear their grievances about the negative impact on tourism of the taxi drivers’ action.
In a surprise move just before 7 AM local time this morning, about 2,000 taxi drivers blocked some of the access roads to the Piraeus port, once more creating inconveniences for tourists arriving who managed to reach the exits with the help of port workers. Meanwhile, newspapers report that within the ranks of taxi drivers there is the desire for a ”freeze” on strikes, since the latter has been underway for more than 10 days, creating economic problems for many taxi drivers. Moreover, during the strike many individuals have acted as impromptu taxi drivers, thereby meeting a large part of the need for urban transport of inhabitants.
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