PESHAWAR, April 29: The joint move of the opposition benches in the NWFP Assembly for regularizing the services of employees appointed on contract basis is likely to prove a futile exercise, according to official sources.

The provincial assembly has discussed the issue of regularizing the services of thousands of employees in the public sector who were recruited, over the years, on contract basis in line with the successive provincial governments’ policy of continuing the ban on fresh recruitments.

The ban was imposed to bring down the non-developmental expenditure of the province. Thousands of employees — mostly teachers — were appointed on contract basis after the ban on fresh recruitments.

However, terming the recruitment on contract basis illegal and in violation of the Constitution, the fragile opposition in the NWFP Assembly was impressing upon the provincial government to regularize their services.

The issue was first taken up for discussion by the provincial assembly in its session on April 24, last, when the parliamentary leaders of the Awami National Party, Pakistan People’s Party (Parliamentarians) and PML-Q in the provincial assembly opposed the ban on regular recruitments.

It again came under discussion on Monday when some of the ruling alliance’s members, too, joined the move of the opposition benches.

Muzaffar Said and Shah Raz, MMA MPAs, took exception to contract appointments and asked the government to regularize the services of employees.

However, the joint opposition’s effort — apparently meant to win over the sympathies of thousands of contract employees’ families — is not likely to impress the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal government in view of its compulsions, financial constraints, legal obligations and commitments with the international donor agencies, sources said.

Official sources said that the move would end in futility in view of the Supreme Court of Pakistan’s instructions in the Musa Wazir versus NWFP Government case.

Senior officers said that the SC had instructed — in its judgment — against regularizing the services of the employees terming it against the fundamental rights of citizen in the spirit of the constitutional provisions.

Officers said that the court had debarred the provincial government from regularizing the services of the employees recruited on contract basis even through an act of provincial legislature.

The court had declared that the employees appointed on contract basis — without following the procedures and fulfilling the requirements of making appointments on regular basis — could not be regularized, added the sources, because it tantamount to the violation of the fundamental rights of the citizens.

“In view of the court’s directives, the provincial assembly and the government could not regularize the services of contract employees after thousands of posts have not been filled in by following the procedure laid down for appointments on regular basis in the public sector departments and entities,” said a source in the provincial establishment department.

Apart from the legalities involved in the matter, the MMA-led provincial government was bound to adhere to the previous provincial government’s policy of making appointments on contract basis in view of its commitments with the World Bank.

The bank released $90 million loan to the province, in July last, under its Structural Adjustment Credit against the three- year roll over reforms programme submitted by the previous provincial government.

The present provincial government was trying to stick to the terms and conditions laid down under the loan agreement to qualify for the second and third tranche of $90 million each in the 2003-04 and 2004-05 financial years.

The loan agreement, according to official sources, made it binding on the NWFP government to continue with its ban on fresh regular appointments.

Explaining the provincial government’s stand on the issue, the provincial minister for law, parliamentary affairs and industry, Malik Zafar-i-Azam told the NWFP Assembly on Monday that the policy to make appointments on contract had been necessitated by successive governments to control the ever increasing pension liability of the province.

Sources said that the NWFP government’s pension bill had recorded a growth at an alarmingly rate of 20 per cent annually by rising to Rs3.6 billion in the 2002-03 financial year from Rs466.5 million in the 1990-91 financial year.

In fulfilment of the previous provincial government’s commitments with the World Bank, the MMA-led government preferred to adopt the newly devised policy meant for making appointments on contract basis.

However, political observers and official circles believed that in view of the provincial government’s limitations, the fragile opposition in the NWFP Assembly might not gain any thing from the debate on the issue of regularizing the services of thousands of contract employees.