KARACHI: Sacked workers of the Pakistan Steel Mill (PSM) on Sunday ended their sit-in they had been holding for a couple of weeks in front of the residence of the mill’s chief executive officer.

They took the decision on a request by Information and Local Government Minister Syed Nasir Hussain Shah, who visited the protesters to express solidarity with sacked workers and also attended funeral of their fellow worker, Sher Muhammad. who died last night during the sit-in.

Speaking to the protesters and media persons, Mr Shah pledged to extend legal, constitutional and moral assistance to the sacked workers and persuaded them to end their sit-in.

He advised the protesters not to rely on “insensitive PTI government”, adding that their sit-in would not have any effect on the “U-turn champions”.

“The PTI government would not have forcibly sacked these workers, who have devoted their entire life serving the mill, if it had sympathy with them,” he said.

The minister recalled that before coming to power the PTI had made a commitment that it would ensure the PSM to continue running and would not sack any worker. However, he said, after coming to power, it took its usual U-turn.

The minister said the Sindh government stood with workers in their legitimate struggle from day one. He said PPP chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari had directed the Sindh government to extend every possible support to the sacked workers. He told the workers that the provincial government had also written to the federal government for seeking control of the PSM and also sent a reminder in this regard.

Mr Shah said that the Sindh Assembly had passed a resolution on PSM workers’ issue. He said the chief minister got included the issue of PSM in the agenda of the Council of Common Interest (CCI) meeting.

The minister said that the Sindh government’s first priority was to make the PSM functional, arguing that the first beneficiaries of this would be its workers.

Published in Dawn, February 8th, 2021