PPP Parliamentary Leader in Senate Raza Rabbani has declared his party’s resolve to resist the government’s endeavours to privatise national assets as Pakistan Steel Mills (PSM) and Pakistan International Airlines (PIA).
Addressing a press conference at the Parliament House on Tuesday, he criticised the government’s efforts to privatise the PSM and PIA to some ‘strongly favoured business associates’, under false assumptions, accusations of illegal overstaffing which had overburdened PSM’s financial aspects.
Rabbani said the PPP had never made any new appointments during its tenure, but rather regularised those working on contract basis, and daily wages; while he also ruled out any bail-out packages granted to Steel Mill during PPP tenure, save for some commercial loans, mark-ups of which PSM failed to pay.
He also cited a Rs 21 billion bail-out package for the PSM by the caretaker government, which was augmented to Rs 28 billion by the industries secretary without prior legally mandatory permission of board.
“Any attempt to privatize Steel Mill shall never be tolerated by labor or PPP, so forget any privatization of Steel Mill”, he cautioned.
He also stressed for bill endeavoring amendment in article 51 to facilitate at least one seat for labor in Parliament, followed by another amendment in article 105 for provision of 2 seats for labor in all Provinces.
He called for all political parties to support this demand, since the bill was labor-friendly.
PPP Senator Syed Ghani reminded the session that it was mandatory for the government to regularise contract and daily wages’ workers within 90 days, something that was not being practiced. He also denied any connection between President Zardari and Riaz Lal Jee.
PPP to resist privatisation of PSM and PIA: Rabbani
