The announcement in detail:
MeRA25 denounces in the strongest possible terms the New Democracy government for the systematic and methodical dismantling of public transport through the implementation of the same destructive ‘ELTA model’. It says this is a political choice fully aligned with the logic of selling off public goods, first by deliberately devaluing services through underfunding and understaffing, and then presenting private operators as ‘saviours’, thereby throwing the door wide open to contractors and vested interests.
While vehicles are being withdrawn from service because of a lack of maintenance and there are not enough workers to meet the network’s needs, the government has chosen to hand routes and operations to private operators through technical consultants instead of strengthening the public system. The reality experienced by passengers every day is record-breaking waiting times, suffocatingly overcrowded vehicles and a network operating on the verge of collapse, not by accident but by political design.
The comparison with the Hellenic Post is not accidental. There, New Democracy implemented the same plan, resulting in a dramatic deterioration in services, labour flexibilisation and, ultimately, a greater burden on the public. Today, the exact same recipe is being applied to public transport, with profits privatised, losses socialised and the public character of the service completely degraded.
At the same time, delays in the delivery of new metro lines and extensions are shifting the burden onto already under-served buses and trolleybuses. The result is a vicious cycle of overload: more passengers on fewer vehicles, longer delays and a decline in the quality of travel.
The government calls this policy ‘modernisation’, but the truth is that it amounts to a clear redistribution of resources in favour of private interests. Instead of hiring drivers and technical staff, renewing the fleet and making substantial investments, it has chosen contracting and direct awards under opaque terms.
Public transport is a social good and essential infrastructure for sustainable mobility, social cohesion and addressing the climate crisis. Privatisation not only fails to solve the problems, but worsens them, leading to a system that is more expensive, less reliable and less accessible for the great majority of society.
Citizens do not need privatisation, but reliable, frequent and affordable public transport. Society can no longer tolerate privatisation experiments that serve the few while burdening the many.
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