KARACHI: During a press conference at his camp office in Clifton on Thursday, Sindh Minister for Education and Labour Saeed Ghani said that the Sindh government would not allow anyone to seize the land and assets of Pakistan Steel Mills (PSM).

Calling the privatisation of institutions the “biggest robbery in the history of this country”, he demanded an investigation into it. “Whatever decision has to be taken regarding the Steel Mills, Pakistan International Airlines, Wapda, Pakistan Railways and other national institutions can be [done] by placing it before the Council of Common Interests. An incompetent and selected government and its federal cabinet can’t take such decisions on its own,” he said.

He said the Sindh chief minister had formed a four-member committee of the provincial cabinet, which would talk to the federal government. “We will write a letter to the federal government regarding the sacked workers and Steel Mills.”

The minister said the Sindh government had earlier also wanted to run the Steel Mills, a request for which was made to former prime minister Nawaz Sharif though nothing came of it.

He said it was sad that thousands of train passengers remained stranded for over 12 hours on their way to Karachi due to the protest that was carried out by the sacked PSM workers on the Bin Qasim train tracks soon after they received their letters of retrenchment and yet the federal government remained unmoved. “We are grateful to the sacked employees and their Supreme Council for ending the sit-in on the railway tracks on our appeal,” he said.

Four-member body formed to talk to federal govt

He said the provincial government had fulfilled its promise to form a committee for looking into the matter of the sacked employees and taking up the matter with the federal government. The four-member committee includes Syed Nasir Hussain Shah, Murtaza Wahab and Waqar Mehdi.

“In addition, we assured the dismissed employees that the Sindh government stands with them and we will not accept this illegal dismissal under any circumstances,” he said.

The minister said that the main reason for the Steel Mills deficit happened some six years ago when the mills started production from 64 per cent to 65pc and stood on its own feet as its deficit began coming down. But then, he said, the PSM was closed down. “Those who shut down the steel mill, justified their decision by pointing to the Sui Southern Gas Company dues of Rs17 billion.”

He said the Sindh government had passed an ordinance after the lockdown, which was later turned into a law that no employee could be fired from his or her job during the coronavirus pandemic and yet the federal government dismissed more than 4,500 employees, which is a clear violation of that law. He further said that the land mafia had its eyes on the PSM.

“They want the land. But we will not allow anyone to consume Steel Mills’ land because it belongs to the Sindh government and was only reserved for Steel Mills,” he said.

Mr Ghani said he was waiting for Federal Minister Asad Umar, who had recorded his own speech with these employees that if the PTI government came and fired the employees of the Steel Mills, he would stand with the Steel Mills and its employees and not the government.

MQM-P, GDA slammed

“We also ask the MQM-P why it remained silent in the cabinet when the decision was taken to dismiss these employees,” he said.

“We ask the GDA why the ministers and members of the federation are not making their case public when the people of Karachi and Sindh are being fired from their jobs,” he said, adding that the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan and the Grand Democratic Alliance should resign from the federal government instead of remaining silent on the issue. He said that the federal government was carrying out an “economic massacre” of the people of Sindh and wondered why the MQM-P and other allies of the federal government were keeping silent and strengthening the hands of the centre.

While replying to a question, the minister said that in the history of this country, privatisation was the biggest robbery and it should be investigated what debt had come down or what progress had been made in the last 30 years since the privatisation of institutions.

President of the Peoples Labour Bureau Sindh Habibuddin Junaidi and officials of other labour unions, including that of Steel Mills, were also present.

Published in Dawn, December 4th, 2020