Greece follows in France's footsteps... Thousands demonstrate in Athens and other cities

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More than 10,000 students, teachers, and employees took to the streets of the capital, Athens, and other Greek cities, on Wednesday, to protest the high cost of living, highlighting the similarities with the situation in France, according to what police and local media reported.

A police spokesman told Agence France-Presse that about five thousand people gathered at midday in the Greek capital, while another three thousand gathered in Thessaloniki, the second largest city in the country.

In addition, the official television "ERT" reported that more than three thousand people participated in a march in the city of Patras in the west of the country.

Maria, a fifty-year-old employee in a municipality near Athens, said in an interview with AFP during her participation in a march heading to Syntagma Square opposite Parliament, "The level of education is very low, schools suffer from a shortage of personnel, and school buildings are dilapidated."

Secondary school students and teachers are protesting the lack of infrastructure and personnel, and demanding increased public spending on the education sector.

According to the Secondary Teachers Union, the shortage in schools amounts to 15,000 teachers.

“Whether in Greece or France, we demand free public education,” Katia Koposidou, a student representative of philosophy and pedagogy at the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, said in an interview with AFP.

As for Athens, student Yiannis Papanikolaou expressed his happiness with “the demonstrations in France,” adding, “This helps us work on change here.” He continued, "The windows (inside some of his school's classrooms) are broken and the heating means are not working."

In Thessaloniki, the largest student city, banners were raised reading: “Greece and France, revolution everywhere, the same problems and the same enemy,” and “From Greece to France, we fight for free public education.”

“We have a plan to continue our protests,” Koposido continued, “because the cost of studying has become unbearable,” noting that “the costs of living are draining our people daily.”

Although the minimum wage has been raised in Greece since the financial crisis, its net value does not exceed 920 euros. On Tuesday evening, dozens of students set up tents in Athens and Thessaloniki.

According to Philippos Armen, a physics student at the University of Thessaloniki, “many European countries suffer from the same problems,” while Albania, neighboring Greece, is also witnessing protests.

For its part, the Public Sector Employees Union (Adidi) joined the student protests, after it had announced a cessation of work in the morning.

While the Public Sector Employees Union praised the “massive demonstrations of the people and youth in France,” it presented a series of demands, including “increasing wages” and “providing vital support to teachers.”

During the Athens march, 17-year-old Nikos Mavroudis explained that “parts of the ceiling collapsed in the bathrooms” at his school located in central Athens.

Recently, a 14-year-old student was injured when part of the classroom ceiling fell on him in Thermi, near Thessaloniki. Also in Athens, a major high school closed its doors after warning of a gas leak.

According to the European Statistical Office (Eurostat), in 2023 Greece allocated 3.3% of its GDP to education, compared to an average of 4.7% in the European Union.

In recent days, the conservative Greek government has sought to avoid any comparison with the demonstrations and acts of violence taking place in France.

Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis stressed on Monday that Greece will "never return to the era of great social unrest" that the country witnessed during the financial crisis between 2009 and 2018, which was characterized by unpopular austerity measures that seriously harmed the population and led to protests and violence.

Last September, the inflation rate in Greece was among the highest in the euro zone, after recording 5.1 percent on an annual basis, compared to an average of 3.8 percent in the region, according to Eurostat.