LAHORE, Sept 9: The City District Government of Lahore claimed to have fully assisted the Punjab Agriculture and Meat Company (PAMCO) in making successful the operation of slaughtering animals at the newly-established modern abattoir at Shahpur Kanjran after the shifting of both old beef and mutton slaughterhouses from Kot Kamboh.

“Since the day we planned to shut slaughtering at the old abattoirs in Kot Kamboh to make the Shahpur Kanjran slaughterhouse operational, we had been facing a strong resentment from a powerful butchers’ mafia that had a full control over the operational activities there since decades.

But we have patiently held dialogues with representatives of butchers and succeeded in convincing them to shift the entire operation to a modern facility which has been built with a sum of over Rs1 billion,” DCO Noorul Amin Mengal said while talking to Dawn here on Sunday.

He said the management of the new slaughterhouse set a record on Saturday by slaughtering at least 2,000 sheep/goats and over 200 cows/buffalos in an eight-hour shift.

The DCO said the CDGL planned to assist the PAMCO in building capacity of new butchers and accommodating all butchers of old slaughterhouses of Kot Kamboh.

He said the number of slaughtering of animals could be increased if the PAMCO increased the number of technical staff at the new slaughterhouse.

VOLUNTEERS: The DCO presided over a meeting here on Sunday and said the CDGL planned to recruit more volunteers for assisting officials in carrying out anti-dengue campaign, polio drives and security of offices.

“The existing strength of 350 volunteers provided by the Civil Defence department is contributing a lot in assisting the CDGL and towns in various affairs. And we will appoint more volunteers in this regard,” he said.

He said the women volunteers were also playing a vital role in this respect, adding that he directed the quarters concerned to pay Rs9,000 per month salary to each volunteer.

ANTI-DENGUE: The Anti-Dengue Day was observed in the provincial metropolis with full enthusiasm on Sunday.

Various activities, including walks, seminars and an anti-dengue spray/fumigation, were carried out by the CDGL, towns, LWMC, Wasa, MPAs and representatives of civil society.

The officials concerned visited door-to-door and distributed dengue kits among citizens at various localities despite rain.