PESHAWAR, Dec 9: The Pakistan Wapda Hydro Electric Central Labour Union has demanded immediate removal of Pesco's finance director for what the union alleged his involvement in corruption and his anti-worker attitude.

A large number of union members took out a protest procession from the Atta Hall on G.T. Road and marched up to the NWFP assembly building. The slogan-chanting workers urged the federal government not to privatize profit-earning organizations like Wapda at the behest of the World Bank and IMF.

They said Pakistan was not a colony of the world financial institutions which were destroying the national industry in the name of structural adjustment programme. Addressing the protesters outside the assembly building here on Thursday, union president Abdul Latif Nizamani alleged that the government had sold profit-earning units at throw-away prices to industrial tycoons who were responsible for the present state of affairs in Pakistan.

He also criticized the policies of downsizing and rightsizing of the government which, according to the union leaders, had caused an unprecedented unemployment and lawlessness in the country.The working class, he warned, would resist the privatization of Wapda's regional organizations.

Union secretary-general Khursheed Ahmed Khan called upon all worker unions to join hands with Wapda workers in their just struggle against the anti-labour bureaucracy. He said they would continue their struggle against the exploitation of workers by multinational companies and their Pakistani supporters.

Later, union representatives met Speaker Bakht Jehan Khan in his chamber and briefed him on the role of the Pesco's finance director, privatization of different wings of Wapda, malpractice and corruption in the electric supply company. The speaker assured them that he would convey their demands to the relevant quarters for necessary action.