Today the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ), the European group of the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ), protested against the recent closure of Greek newspaper Ora gia Spor, which shut down operations two days ago without giving any warning to its staff.
“This is a totally unacceptable and simply scandalous way to behave”, said EFJ Chair Arne König. “We expect employers to respect European standards of social dialogue, instead we see media owners closing down their company without a single word of warning towards their own employees”.
On Wednesday, the owners of the newspaper, Evangelos and Konstantina Siembos, decided to close the media outlet and simply locked the offices. They did not provide any reason for closing to the public or to the 70 journalists and media staff on the payroll. The company simply phoned some employees to inform them that the offices would be locked and then shut down the office after 16 years of the newspaper’s prolific and continuous presence in sports news.
Moreover, Siembos’ company did not pay for workers’ salaries, wages and arrears, which have gone unpaid for the past three months along with the company’s payments to workers’ insurance funds and workers’ compensation fees specified by Greek law.
The Executive Board of the EFJ affiliate, the Journalists Union of the Athens Daily Newspapers (JUADN), unanimously decided to take legal action against the employers in order to protect the workers’ rights, to gives some funds to journalists -union members or non-members alike- who lost their jobs and to confirm that will stand by the employees’ side on all mobilizations.
The EFJ calls upon the Greek government to enforce the Greek laws and EU Directives and ensure that the owners engage in social dialogue with their employees and that the media workers’ rights are protected.
For more information contact the EFJ at 32 2 235 2200
The EFJ represents over 260.000 journalists in more than 40 countries
