90 officials, workers terminated from National Fertilizer Marketing Ltd

NFC terminates services of employees hired without due process in subsidiary.

LAHORE: The National Fertilizer Corporation (NFC) has terminated the services of 90 employees of National Fertilizer Marketing Limited (NFML) – a subsidiary of NFC. These personnel had been hired without following a proper recruitment process from 2008 to 2012, The Express Tribune has learnt.

The terminated employees include deputy managers, assistant managers, executives, clerks, peons, security guards, gardeners and subordinate office staff. The corporation served termination letters to all the men on the 26th of this month. Those made redundant were given 15 days worth of salary, a condition under the contract appointment, said an official requesting anonymity.

“The corporation has advertised all posts that have fallen vacant after the termination of these personnel, in order to recruit suitable and eligible men on merit through the proper procedure for recruitments,” the official added.

The former chairman of the NFC is allegedly responsible for recruiting these men without properly advertising vacancies and following the recruitment process. Out of the 90, about 70 hail from tehsil Gojra – the hometown of the former chairperson. Of these, 36 were allegedly deployed in the same town where NFML had a stock, the official added. This irregularity had raised questions over the recruitment process.

All men were recruited directly, on the instructions of the competent authority in the organisation. The new NFC chairman, after assuming charge in July this year, had constituted a committee to scrutinise the records of all these men. The committee informed the chairman that all appointments had been made on contract without adopting proper procedure, and significant irregularities had been committed in the process. The committee maintained that all men were recruited on political grounds and a policy of nepotism.

While taking serious notice, the chairman fired all 90 workers during this week, while providing half a month’s worth of salaries to them. The organisation will now conduct a written examination of all applicants for advertised vacancies, and interview those successful in the process before offering employment to them. The organisation will also send a list of all successful men to the company’s board, which is headed by the chairperson, for a final decision, the official added.

A terminated official claimed the organisation was victimising those persons whose services had been terminated, while others who had been recruited during the same period as them had been retained. The termination was based on an arbitrary “like and dislike policy”, he alleged.

A senior official of organisation, who requested not to be named, said all men had been recruited without due process, and were terminated only after scrutiny of their records by the competent authority.

NFC Chairperson Rizwan Mumtaz Ali was contacted for comments, but was not available.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 29^th, 2012.