Working overtime: Govt finally releases due funds for municipal employees

Minister says workers will receive payments within two days.

PESHAWAR/ CHARSADDA: Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa’s (K-P) Local Government (LG) has released Rs380,000 for overtime payments of Municipal Corporation employees.

While talking to The Express Tribune, the corporation’s employee Daraz Khan confirmed that hundreds of his coworkers have been waiting to receive overtime payments for the past one year. He believed that the corporation deliberately withheld funds using delay tactics.

LG Minister Inyatullah Khan ordered Municipal Corporation Administrator Rashid Ahmad Khan to pay the special duty increment to all employees.

General Secretary United Municipal Workers (UMW) Muhammad Fazal said that employees working in all four Peshawar towns have yet to receive overtime pay.

The overtime was served during special holidays including Muharramul Haram and Eid, according to a female employee who added that waiting any longer was proving to be difficult.

Khan assured that employees would receive their dues within the next two days. He confirmed that the amount comprised of five overtime payments – two carried forward from last year and three for the current year.

He claimed that this was the first time that the municipal administration was going to make ‘overtime’ payments, adding all other dues had already been paid.

Meanwhile, Charsadda’s Municipal Workers Union (MWU) President Abdul Rashid demanded that the government address employee promotions by March 24 at the earliest.

Charsadda Municipal Committee employees have threatened to stop reporting for duty and staged a protest over the delay in promotions. Rashid said that the government should take worker concerns more seriously and be fair to retired employees.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 20^th, 2014.