Farmers in Karditsa continue their mobilizations as they proceeded with the closure of the National Road.
Their withdrawal from the Platykambos blockade was announced earlier by the farmers “Committee of 180,000 flooded parakarlion acres”, through a statement and a letter to the Prime Minister, 24 hours after the president of the Agricultural Cooperative Platykambos, Yannis Koukoutsis, spoke about the new appointment for the disasters of Daniel to which the Prime Minister committed.
“We call with this open letter to the Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis to meet with a committee representing the farmers of the whole of Thessaly, whose lands have been destroyed by the floods,” stressed the farmers from the marginal areas in their letter.
“The Panhellenic committee of protesting farmers in Sindos decided to form a 15-member committee that would meet the Prime Minister at the Maximou.
In the committee, not only were we not represented, but our demands, which we were the first of all farmers to make at the beginning of January, were not included in the basic text of the demands,” it is noted elsewhere.
The crucial national conference of representatives of blockades from all over Greece will take place tomorrow at noon in Nikaia after the measures announced by Kyriakos Mitsotakis in the meeting he had with the 15-member committee of farmers with the mood being in favor of continuing the mobilizations.
However, reports say that the farmers from Macedonia will meet separately at the same time, probably in Koufalia.
Previous mobilisations
At 12:30 the farmers closed the road in Megalochori Trikala while they plan to make the same at 5:30 in the afternoon on the E65 in Karditsa.
The continuation of the mobilizations decided the farmers of the blockade of Anthili in the meeting held at 12:00 noon. Shortly after 1:00 farmers of the blockade climbed the highway and the traffic was carried out from bypass roads with the help of the police.
A similar movement will take place at 4:00 and the farmers of the blockade in Skala Atalanti.
Skylakakis: There is no trace of fiscal space from now on
At the same time, the Minister of Environment and Energy, Theodoros Skylakakis said that “there is no trace of fiscal space from here on for the case of farmers. There can always be an open dialogue, but with open roads.”
About the 7 cents per kilowatt hour that the farmers are asking for the price to be set on rural electricity, Mr. Skylakakis replied that a social group cannot be given electricity below cost.
He also pointed out that farmers receive state subsidies, the largest of any other sector of the economy, adding that these subsidies have very strict limits set by Europe.
On the tax-free agricultural oil that farmers are asking for, he said that this is an issue that the government will discuss exhaustively with them, as there must be a system that is fairer, to work on the basis of actual agricultural consumption.
The government’s position
A substantial step to de-escalate the tension with farmers and the people of the primary sector in general is estimated by the Maximou that it took place in the wake of Kyriakos Mitsotakis’ meeting with the representatives of 15 agricultural blockades yesterday at the Maximou.
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In the meeting that lasted about 2.5 hours, sources from both the government and the farmers’ front confirmed that low tones prevailed and that the discussion that took place was substantial.
The government attempted a reprieve, with a generous arrangement for rural power in the long run, but also with a comprehensive intervention on the VAT on rural oil and now the ball is being passed to the farm blockades.
