MANSEHRA: The low grade employees of the health department in Mansehra, Mingora and Timergara on Thursday boycotted duties and held protest demonstrations, asking the government to pay them the health professional allowance (HPA) like doctors and paramedics.

The sweepers, midwives and watchmen and other categories of lower grade employees observed the strike and didn’t discharge duty during the entire day.

In Mansehra, they employees gathered at the King Abdullah Teaching Hospital and demanded the provincial government to immediately announce the health professional allowance for them.

Speaking on occasion, Mohammad Nazeer said that the government had accepted their demand of HPA on Nov 22, but they were yet to get the allowance. The protesters said that the provincial government had been paying HPA to the doctors, paramedics and nursing staff, but the lower grade employees of health department were being denied that allowance.

“We have also been putting our lives at risk of various serious diseases while working in hospitals, but the health professional allowance is not being paid to us,” said Mr Nazeer.

Hold protest demos in Mansehra, Mingora and Timergara

In Mingora, hundreds of employees of the health department held a protest demonstration on Thursday against the provincial government’s decision of taking back the HPA from the class-IV employees and clerical staff.

The protesters, including class-IV employees and clerical staff, started their demonstration from their offices and hospitals and gathered in front of the Swat Press Club.

Malakand division president of class-IV employees from health department, Akbar Ali Khan, and APCA press secretary Samiullah while addressing the gathering said that the class-IV employees and clerical staff equally deserved to get the health professional allowance as was given to the doctors and paramedics staff.

They said that the government instead of giving relief to the lower class was putting financial burden on them.

In Timergara, the Class-IV Employees Association, Lower Dir, on Thursday demanded of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government and health ministry to ensure provision of health professional allowance to all class-IV employees working in the health department.

The demand was made during a protest rally held in front of the Timergara Press Club. The class-IV employees working at the government hospitals boycotted their duties and marched on the road near the DHQ hospital.

Addressing the protesting employees, president of the association in Timergara, Noorullah, paramedical association’s Lower Dir president Khurshid Iqbal, All Pakistan Clerks’ Association district president Mohammad Shair and PPP councillor Alam Zeb said that the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa had promised to provide class-IV employees of the health department with the HPA, but nothing was done in this regard.

They announced that protest demonstrations would be held at the district headquarters on Thursdays and Fridays and threatened to boycott polio duty if their demand was not accepted.

Published in Dawn, January 13th, 2017