Terming the regularisation of Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) employees, working on daily wages, on the orders of President Asif Ali Zardari an additional burden, members of the National Assembly Standing Committee on Defense on Friday said the decision should be reviewed.
National Assembly Standing Committee met with Abdul Ghani Talpur in the chair to discuss the PIA losses, flight delays, the Hajj operation, the presence of cockroaches on planes and PIA flight rates. The Committee was informed about the details of aircraft to employee ratio, the financial position of PIA and viability of the present fleet.
PIA Managing Director Nadeem Yusufzai told the committee that PIA losses stood at Rs 140 billion and fulfilling the regularisation orders of President Zardari would cost Rs 61.4 million. He said while no one had been regularised so far, PIA had planned to keep workers on daily wage for two more years prior to regularisation. PML-N MNA Sardar Mahtab Abbasi and other PML-N MNAs expressed reservations over PIA’s ability to bear the regularisation of daily wage employees and asked for the decision to regularise such employees to be reviewed.
Moreover, the committee was told that out of a PIA fleet of 39 aircrafts, 23 were nearly worn-out and cost more in terms of maintenance and consumed more fuel. Yusufzai said PIA planned to replace aircrafts from March or April next year and all planes would be replaced by 2020. He said PIA, as national airline, could not stop operating on loss-making routes since it would trouble people traveling to these destinations. On the Hajj flights delay, the PIA MD told the committee PIA was not solely responsible since other factors such as the availablity of space on terminals in Saudi Arabia was beyond PIA’s control. Meanwhile, the committee directed the Ministry of Defense Secretary to submit a report on the issue of delay in the schedule and cancellation of flights after a through probe in the next meeting of the NA body on December 23.