RAWALPINDI: A clash between passengers and PIA employees protesting outside Benazir Bhutto International Airport (BBIA) was averted on Saturday by police and Airport Security Force (ASF) personnel.

Over 50 passengers carrying PIA tickets who were refused by private airlines chanted slogans against PIA employees, who were protesting plans for PIA’s privatisation and the killing of PIA employees in Karachi five days ago.

The passengers, in turn, held the striking employees responsible for the delay in flights they needed to board to go back to their jobs in Dubai and the Gulf states. The PIA employees responded with slogans against the federal government.

As tensions heightened, however, police and ASF intervened to avoid a possible clash.

People’s Unity of PIA Employees Union president Ramzan Laghari, general secretary Suhail Mukhtar, Air League of Employees Union (CBA) general secretary Zaigham Sajjad Kiyani, Malik Nasir Awan of the Insaaf Workers Front and PIA Employees Association president Abdul Mateen Abbasi reached the scene moments later to cool down both the parties.

They said the federal government was responsible for the passengers’ woes and for the cancellation of their flights. They said PIA employees had been agitating for their rights, and against the killing of two of their colleagues.

The PIA employees’ protest continued outside BBIA, and no prominent political party member joined the protestors. The protestors were addressed by representatives of the workers’ joint action committee, who said protests would continue until the government scrapped its plan to privatise the airline.

PTI chief Imran Khan arrived at BBIA, on his way to Karachi to join protesting PIA employees there, and stopped his vehicle outside the PIA protestors’ camp and waved to express solidarity with them.

Published in Dawn, February 7th, 2016

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