Standing committee: Finance dept unwilling to grant permanent jobs to govt employees

Lecturers, lady health workers of PPHI & NPIW employees demanded the provincial government give them permanent jobs.

KARACHI:

The special committee of the Sindh Assembly, formed to find a solution to demands by government workers to give them permanent jobs, met on Wednesday but was unable to resolve the issue.

Lecturers belonging to the education department, lady health workers, doctors associated with the Peoples Public Healthcare Initiative (PPHI) and National Programme for Improvement of Watercourses (NPIW) employees have demanded that the provincial government give them permanent jobs.

The committee, headed by MPA Syed Bachal Shah, includes chairmen of the standing committees on law, finance, planning, population, education and agriculture departments.

However, Sindh Finance Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah started the proceedings by criticising the presence of media personnel in the conference room.

“We are discussing a public issue and [therefore] the media should be allowed to report the event,” countered Pakistan Muslim League-Functional MPA Nusrat Seher Abbasi. However, the finance minister was adamant. “I will not sit in the meeting unless [all] the media personnel have left.” Bachal Shah then requested the journalists to leave the meeting room.

Sources privy to the meeting later told the media that the officials had reached no decision about the future of the public employees. The finance department, they said, appeared unwilling to the idea of granting permanent jobs to the employees, as that would increase the burden on the provincial exchequer.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 4^th, 2012.