Ministers keep rehiring despite cash crunch
Just a day after it emerged that the government has recruited 230 Athens metro workers who had been sacked by the previous government, news of additional rehirings emerged on Thursday despite the fact that state coffers are said to be all but empty.
The Government Gazette on Thursday published a decision by State Minister Nikos Pappas rehiring employees to the revived state broadcaster ERT and to the Athens-Macedonian News Agency.
Tuesday’s edition of the Government Gazette included a decision by Interior Minister Nikos Voutsis for the rehiring of 1,293 school guards. According to the decision, the employees are to assume the same positions in the same municipalities where they had been serving before they were inducted into a so-called mobility scheme for civil servants that was introduced by the previous conservative-led government in line with the creditors’ demands.
In a related development, Alternate Minister of Administrative Reform Giorgos Katrougalos has set up a committee to oversee what leftist SYRIZA has dubbed a “voluntary mobility scheme.” Rehired workers who do not want to return to their old posts, for whatever reason, are expected to participate in the scheme.
