On Monday 27th of August 2018 a huge demonstration was held by the KKE in the area of eastern Attica ( in Nea Makri ), an area that one month ago was ravaged by catastrophic fires with the result that roughly 100 people lost their lives and dozens of houses were destroyed by fire.

A huge crowd gathered for the demonstration, among them  fire victims who responded to  the KKE's call. This mass attendance was the result of actions that were carried out from the very first moment by area communists in order to provide substantial support to the victims and to organize the people in defense of their rights, supporting solidarity actions but also the just demands set out by labor unions and organizations of the area.

The GS of the CC of the KKE, Dimitris Koutsoumpas spoke at the demonstration.
The GS of the CC of the KKE emphasized among other things that the situation with such catastrophic fires in Greece that has been developing over time reveals the “greatness” and the “achievements” of a society that is built on the basis of exploitation of workers and the commercialization of everything for the benefit of the vested interests.

It is highly hypocritical and offensive that the key responsible parties for this continuing crime, the governments and parties of SYRIZA-ANEL today and ND and PASOK in the past, shed crocodile tears for the pain inflicted and the catastrophe.

The policies that sacrifice lives and the environment for the profits of the business circles are the very same ones that cut salaries and pensions, demolish labor, social security and social rights.

D. Koutsoumpas, after analyzing the positions of the KKE for the relief and support of the fire victims, stressed that the people must not compromise with today's barbarism, for so many people to lose their lives in fires and floods in the year 2018. He noted that today's situation can be reversed. People's basic needs can be met with centralized scientific planning, within the framework of workers' power.

What is needed is a movement that demands works and infrastructure that can serve popular needs, that will join up with the struggle that is being waged against the huge problems that tyrannize the people, in a great social alliance that aims against today's barbaric road of development, the rotten bourgeois state, the very capitalist system itself and the parties and leaderships that serve it.

Referring to the responsibilities of the government of the “left” SYRIZA and the “patriotic” ANEL, he noted the following:

And what have we been hearing all these past days....

Apparently,  the government has only been in power for 3.5 years and it hasn't had time to change the negative situation that was created by previous governments. That is, this is where they identify their own political responsibility.

In these 3.5 years, however, the government:

--“Had time” to vote in dozens of memorandum laws.
--“Had time” to cut salaries, pensions, benefits.
--“Had time” to reduce funding for the area of forest protection and firefighting, reaching the point where the Forest Service receives 0.035% of the state budget (118.8 million euro) when only for NATO equipment the government boasts that it gives 2% of the GDP (4 billion euros) for this.
--The government also “had time” to send around 700 firefighters to guard the privatized airports, those airports that it sold to the German “Fraport”, further depleting the Fire brigade.
--And, it even “had time” to reject KKE's legislative proposal to establish permanent positions for all the contractual firefighters.

So the problem is not what they "did not have time to do", but what they chose to do. Because they simply continued the same catastrophic road for our people that the previous ones had prepared.

Because ultimately, it is the civil service staff of the same lawless, large, business interests. "
28/8/18