Roundup: Cyprus griped by strikes as it exits three-year economic adjustment program

The Cypriot government is currently faced with a spade of strikes in the crucial sectors of energy production, port services and public health, a few days after international lenders gave a permission to it to exit a three-year economic adjustment program.

The strikes are dealing a serious blow to the general economy, testing the government's ability to continue reforms. They are also causing hardship to thousands of people.

The center-right government considers the strike action to be politically motivated as the country is heading towards general elections on May 23.

Cyprus weathered its economic adjustment program without the strikes against austerity seen in other bailout countries such as Greece, Portugal and Spain.

It also managed to return to economic growth against all projections by its lenders after five yeas of recession which caused a cumulative shrinking of about 13 percent in the island's GDP.

But a few days after the Eurogroup and the International Monetary Fund allowed Cyprus to exit its 10 billion-euro (11.16 billion U.S. dollars) bailout at the end of March, strikes mushroomed in the most sensitive sectors.

Employees of the state-owned Electricity Authority of Cyprus (EAC) abruptly announced on Wednesday that they will go on an open-end strike on April 6, raising the specter of a general blackout.

They are opposing a plan under the 2013 bailout adjustment program to split the EAC into two autonomous state-owned corporations: one managing energy production and the other running the power transfer grid.

Energy Minister Yiorgos Lakkotrypis accused the unions that they set out demands that are not related to the terms of employment of their members but infringe on the right of management of EAC, which belongs to its board and the state.

Ruling DISY party leader Averof Neophytou also claimed that some political parties prefer to conduct their electoral campaign through strikes.

His claim gains credibility by the fact that all unions involved in the strike action are affiliated with opposition parties of the left and the center, which had opposed moves to privatize state-owned companies under the terms of the bailout deal.

This is exactly the case of Port Authority employees. All trade unions associated with opposition parties declared on Monday a previously unannounced indefinite strike at the main commercial port of Limassol, a week before the parliament is set to debate regulations which finalize the privatization of the ports commercial operations.

Though the unions said they were demanding explicit safeguards for the jobs of their members, they also demanded a postponement of the debate which sets out the details of deals, under which three separate corporations will take up operations at the port.

The two strikes followed the declaration of a strike by about two-thirds of nurses at government hospitals nine days ago in support of a demand to upgrade their salary scales.

The remaining one third of nurses belonging to a separate union representing most government employees did not join the strike.

But patients are turned away from government hospitals or are referred to private practitioners with the government bearing the cost. Endit