300,000 demonstrated in the Portuguese capital’s Terreiro do Paço [Palace Square] "to show the troika" that there will be "no surrender", writes Diário de Notícias on the Saturday 11 February anti-austerity protests. This was the biggest demonstration organised by the CGTP, the country’s largest trade union federation, for 30 years, and comes just four days before the EC/ECB/IMF troika arrives in Lisbon to assess compliance with the terms of 2011’s €78bn bailout.
The Portuguese, DN writes, came out to protest against unemployment [currently at 13.6% and rising], freezing of the minimum wage, changes to unemployment benefit, cuts to holiday pay and Christmas bonuses for civil servants and pensioners, as well as VAT hikes on essential goods. In its editorial, the Lisbon daily notes that -
... the new times approaching, carried by extreme austerity, are a serious warning that the government should not ignore. […] Poverty and growing despair are not “whining” [an allusion to a remark made by the PM that the Portuguese should not be “namby-pambies”]. It is a warning that urgent action is needed. According to the CGTP, 300,000 were on the streets of Lisbon yesterday. Without disorder or any signs of violence. […] But nothing, really nothing, guarantees that it will always be like this. For this reason, the Greek example should not, must not, be ignored.
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