KARACHI, July 10: National Labour Federation (NLF) Karachi President Rafiq Ahmed on Tuesday expressed concern over the unscheduled and prolonged power suspensions and said these signalled the complete failure of the Karachi Electric Supply Corporation.

The labour leader, while talking to reporters, said that the KESC officials were least concerned in minimising the consumers’ miseries and were concentrating only on minting money.

Expressing his astonishment over a statement of the KESC managing director that power outages would continue for the next five years, he said the statement had exposed the tall claims of the rulers about providing relief to the people after the utility’s privatisation.

He said no investment had been made in power generation despite repeated claims by the rulers, nor were any serious efforts made to enhance the performance of outdated power plants.

The NLF leader said that the salaries of the KESC employees had not been increased for the past few years while the officers were getting handsome salaries and other perks.Mr Rafiq stressed the need for holding a labour referendum in the KESC, saying it was the right of the employees under the Constitution and the ILO convention.

He said the KESC management feared that a fair referendum and the formation of an independent union would put an end to their malpractices.

He demanded the regularisation of all daily wage and contract employees and urged an early end to the ongoing hours-long load-shedding in the metropolis.