Unpaid salaries: SMC employees work in private companies to make ends meet

Employees have not been paid for more than a year

SUKKUR: Irked with the non-payment of salaries since more than a year, many Sukkur Municipal Corporation (SMC) employees have started working in private companies to earn livelihoods for their families.

SMC employees have not been paid since more than a year, leaving their families to starve. As a result, many of the employees resorted to regular borrowing of money from their friends and relatives. However, family and friends have now stopped lending them money as well. Local grocery shop owners have also declined provision of grocery items on loans, for an indefinite period.

Disgruntled and rattled with their dilemma, nearly a 100 employees saw no option but to start working with banks and other private companies to support their families, according to an SMC employee, who requested anonymity. Most of the low-grade officers are working on either daily wages or on contract-basis as peons in different banks, including the National Bank of Pakistan, Allied Bank, United Bank and NIB Bank.

"After losing hope about the disbursement of salary from SMC, I joined Sukkur United Bank as a peon on daily wages," an SMC employee, H*, told The Express Tribune. "I have been working here [United Bank] for the last seven months and get paid regularly," he shared.

Many of the SMC employees have fallen ill due to tension from not being paid since so long, said H*, adding that families of SMC employees who have died during service are still waiting for the authorities to clear their dues.

"My wife is diabetic and needs medicines and vaccination regularly. Without getting my salary, it became impossible for me to continue her treatment," shared S*, another SMC employee, who is now working for a private company. He also used to work part-time at a clinic in the evening to earn extra money.

"Every month, SMC employees' stage protest demonstrations and sit-ins and the authorities promise to disburse salaries, but nothing happens," he continued, adding that due to indifferent attitudes of the authorities, municipal employees are left with only two options; to either find another job or commit suicide.

"North Sindh Urban Services Corporation is getting huge funds every month, then why are the SMC employees denied salaries?" questioned Muhammad Asif, an SMC union office bearer. The authorities give us [the employees] a lollipop about salary disbursement, every month, but to no avail, Asif added.

These employees have families to feed at any cost and if they are not paid timely, they surely will find other ways to earn their livelihood, said Asif.

Meanwhile, the Sukkur deputy commissioner Dr Waheed Asghar Bhatti, who is also the SMC administrator, refuted all claims of SMC employees not being paid since the last year. "Salaries were disbursed before Eidul Fitr," said Bhatti.

However, he admitted that funds for seven to nine months' worth of salaries remain to be given by the government. "It was wrong to say that no salaries are being disbursed. Employees are paid as and when we [SMC] get funds from the government," informed Bhatti.

"I have received information about the SMC employees working in private companies and an inquiry is under way," said Bhatti, adding that employees found doing dual jobs will be sacked from SMC. 

*Names withheld on request for anonymity 

Published in The Express Tribune, August 22^nd,  2016.