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Athens Polytechnic 2011: "Bread-Education-Freedom" says the banner. by protagon.gr
The 17th of November is a landmark-date for modern Greece. Thirty-eight years ago, in 1973, the massive uprising of the students at the Athens Polytechnic led to the fall of the military Junta which had been established in the country since 1967. The demonstrations which had started a few days ago ended in bloodshed when a tank crashed the gates of the Polytechnic thus killing approximately 25 students - a number which may be much higher according to various sources. It was the morning of November 17, 1973.
The then major slogan of the rebelled students was the legendary: "Bread-Education-Freedom" . The anti-imperialist spirit was dominant within the youth movement and the walls around the Polytechnic were full of anti-NATO, anti-USA written slogans: "NATO out of Greece" . A quite obvious reaction as long as Washington had stood side-by-side to the Colonels who had abolished Democracy so violently. An unholy alliance which also led to the July 1974 tragic events in Cyprus, after the Turkish military invasion. Only 26 years later, in 1999, President Clinton would officially apologize to the Greeks for the US support towards Athens dictatorial regime.
Today, thirty-eight years since the tragic events of November 17, the country commemorates her heroes. Those students who gave their lifes for freedom and democracy; those who stood at the gates of the Polytechnic, holding the Greek flag and singing the national anthem while the tank was coming towards them. Apparently, the motto "Bread-Education-Freedom" seems to be extremely current under the present circumstances of economic depression and austerity. Thousands of Greeks marched today in the country's largest cities, Athens and Thessaloniki, not only to commemorate the heroes of the 1973 events but to demonstrate an obvious thing: that 37 years since the restoration of Democracy the nation lives under the dictatorial rule of the Banks, the IMF and the EU plutocracy.
It is not an exaggeration. About 1 million Greeks (1/10 of the whole population) are unemployed, almost 40% of the youth population (under 25 years of age) cannot find a proper job and an upreceded attack on the public sector is undergoing through privatizations. The tragic irony: the new coalition government which has been formed under the premiership of former banker Lucas Papademos includes four members of the ultra-nationalist, far-right party LAOS ; its characteristic that the current Minister of Infrastructure, Transport and Networks, Makis Voridis, a lawyer by profession, has been Secretary of the pro-Junta, far-right National Political Union (Epen) during his youth in the '80s. Ironically, Epen had been founded by Georgios Papadopoulos himself, the Colonel who led the dictatorial regime from 1967 to 1974. A black, disgraceful spot on the country which gave birth to Democracy.
The political and social circumstances make the commemoration of the November 1973 Uprising more significant than ever. The struggle of the then students for freedom and democracy consist a great example of patriotism and revolution for the new Greek generations. Especially during a period of social turmoil, from Greece to the Middle East and from the Occupy movements in the United States to the Indignados of Spain. The slogan of "Bread-Education-Freedom" is still fresh as it was 38 years ago and reminds us of what the masses can achieve when they unite their desire for justice and liberty. The modern dictatorship of the markets and the banking system shall not pass.
Watch: "The Rehearsal", a film by Jules Dassin about the 1973 Polytechnic events, staring Melina Mercouri, Mikis Theodorakis, Olympia Dukakis, Stephen Diacrussi , Arthur Miller.
