KESC makes work safety a top priority

CEO distributes trophies and cash rewards at ‘Safety Leaders Award’.

KARACHI: The Karachi Electric Supply Company (KESC) chief executive, Tabish Gauhar, said that they have made work safety for employees a top priority in the business plan with an ultimate vision for an ‘accident-free KESC’.

Gauhar addressed the ‘Safety Leaders Award’ ceremony on Monday, to honour the best safety performers in distribution and generation categories.

Distribution Region III and the combined cycle power plant at Korangi were declared safety leaders for 2010, in their respective categories. Distribution department’s Amer Zia, and transmission and generation authority’s Tahir Ali Khan received cash awards of Rs100,000 with a ‘safety trophy’ and ‘certificate of excellence’ for their departments.

When the KESC envisioned becoming a national safety leader in 2009, the greatest challenge was to change the mindset of employees because they accepted work-related accidents as part of their work package, said the CEO. As a matter of fact, safety was their last priority, he added.

Nevertheless, the company regards health and safety of employees important, and that is why they allocated resources and deployed a team of professionals to run the health and safety department as a round-the-clock function.

“Today, occupational health and safety are embedded in all facets of our operations and we can see the culture taking root throughout the organisation,” he said. “To progress towards safety excellence, we will need to adopt an aggressive approach towards proactive safety management by mitigating all latent hazards.” Press release

Published in The Express Tribune, February 8^th, 2011.