Bani Gala sit-in: Contractual employees want jobs regularised

Protesters refuse to sit National Testing Service exams prior to regularisation.

ISLAMABAD: The standoff between contractual employees and the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) government continued on Wednesday. The talks between the protesting employees and Director-General (DG) of Education and ministers, which continued for six hour till the filing of this report, at Imran Khan’s Bani Gala farmhouse remained inconclusive.

The contractual employees including teachers associated with the Workers Welfare Board (WWB) have set up protest camps to press for their demand — that the provincial government regularise them on their jobs.

Hundreds of protesters, who reached Bani Gala on April 12, have refused to end the sit-in until their demand is met. The demonstrators also include family members of the contractual employees. “I will not go back till my demands are fulfilled,” said Najeebullah, a schoolteacher.

WBB President, Younas Marwat said that for the past one year, they had been protesting outside the provincial assembly for regularisation. “When no one paid any heed, we decided to come to Bani Gala,” he added.

Marwat said that the K-P government had decided to advertise the jobs and made a test under the National Testing System (NTS) a requirement. “It is not acceptable to us,” he added. The existing employees should be regularised instead of asking them to take the NTS test, Marwat demanded.

The protesting contractual employees were appointed during the previous ANP provincial government. At that time, there was no NTS test requirement.

The PTI, after forming the government in the province, made clearing an NTS test a requirement for all appointments, contractual or otherwise.

Saleem Qalander, a school teacher from Lakki Marwat, said that he was appointed as a school teacher in 2011 on contract but the provincial government had not regularised him. “We voted for PTI but it has disappointed us,” he said.

Sarfraz Durani, a polio worker, claimed that over 270 polio workers had joined the teachers as they had not received their salaries for the last one year. He said that the polio workers were performing their duties and risking their lives, but the provincial government was still not paying them.

Hasina Gul, who works as a technician at the Expanded Programme on Immunisation (EPI), in Chitral, told The Express Tribune, that for the last one year, she had not received her salary from the provincial government.

Until the filing of this report, negotiations were still ongoing between representatives of the contractual employees and the PTI leaders, including party chief Imran Khan.

PTI Secretary General Jahangir Tareen was contacted for comment, but directed The Express Tribune to K-P Minister for Public Health and Engineering Shah Farman.

Repeated attempts were made to contact Farman and PTI Spokesperson Dr Shireen Mazari, but neither was available for comment.

PTI core committee member Faisal Javed Khan said the appointments were made on politically basis and the party has to ensure fresh inductions are on merit. He said that if the protesters clear NTS exams, regularisation would be possible. Khan said the protesters have no proof that they were appointed on merit. When asked about status of negotiations, Khan said he did not have an update.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 16^th, 2015.