Budget woes: FESCO employees protest nominal wage raise

FAISALABAD:

Hundreds of Faisalabad Electric Supply Company (FESCO) employees staged a demonstration Thursday, protesting what they called a nominal raise in their salaries in the federal budget for 2014-15. The protest was called by the Wapda Pegham Union and union leaders Sirajuddin and Mian Iftikhar led the rally.

The rally began at the FESCO headquarters. Participants held banners and placards and marched on Canal Road up to Abdullahpur Chowk. They held a sit-in there to press for a substantial raise in wages. Sirajuddin said the price hike under the present government had gone up in some cases by 200 per cent while the raise announced for government employees’ was 10 per cent. “This means most of us will only receive Rs500 or Rs1,000 more...this is not fair,” he said. Iftikhar said the government should have announced a generous raise in salaries, “at least 50 per cent...instead it forced the employees to come on to the roads to demand fair wages.”

Published in The Express Tribune, June 6^th, 2014.