State Audit Council

Next week will likely see the conclusion of the sale of railway service operator Trainose, while the contract for the sale of 67 percent of Thessaloniki Port Authority (OLTH) has been put off until September.

A ruling by the State Audit Council that was made public on Friday paves the way for the disbursement of months of unpaid wages to thousands of municipal sanitation workers on expired short-term contracts.

Local authority workers on short-term contracts staged a demonstration outside the offices of the Interior Ministry on Tuesday, demanding the granting of permanent status, but they broke up the rally after Minister Panos Skourletis reportedly offered unionists some reassurances.

Unions representing local authority workers on short-term contracts are threatening to call strike action if 15,000 workers lose their jobs in line with a court ruling issued earlier this week that found government legislation extending their contracts to be unconstitutional.

A Greek court has ruled that government legislation extending the contracts of about 15,000 local authority workers is against the country's Constitution, Kathimerini understands.

The State Audit Council said that the permanent hiring of short-term contract workers is also unconstitutional.

Racing against time to meet its commitments to Greece's international creditors, the government appeared unfazed on Wednesday after the State Audit Council warned on Tuesday that legislating pension cuts for 2019 would be unconstitutional.

The Plenary of the State Audit Council has ruled that the cuts to main and supplementary pensions that the government and its creditors have agreed on contravene the European Convention of Human Rights, sources said on Tuesday night.

Privatization projects concerning rail service operator Trainose and carriage maintenance company Rosco have remained frozen over the last four months as the State Audit Council has yet to rule on the legitimacy of the concession contract of 100 percent of Trainose.

The government is seeking to bring the statute of limitations for liability in cases of mismanagement of state money down to 10 years, according to sources from both the Justice Ministry and the State Audit Council. That means that after a decade, it will no longer be possible to bring charges against a public sector official suspected of mismanaging state funds.

The State Audit Council gave the green light on Wednesday for the Attica Regional Authority to provide 7 million euros for the improvement of Panathinaikos soccer club?s grounds on Alexandras Avenue in central Athens.