ISLAMABAD, Nov 15: The government will pay over Rs17 billion out of public money as 50 per cent share of Rs35 billion layoff cost of rendering more than 29,000 employees of Pakistan Telecommunications Company Limited jobless through voluntary separation scheme (VSS).
A decision to this effect was taken at a recent meeting of the cabinet committee on privatisation (CCOP), led by the outgoing Prime Minister, Shaukat Aziz, who advised the relevant quarters that “press handling and employee handling of the scheme may be discreetly and effectively choreographed,” to avoid unrest and backlash, reveals official record.
This will be the country’s single biggest layoff and highest payment to be made out of public money, technically called privatisation proceeds.
The military authorities had recently expressed concern over increased Indian ingress in Pakistan’s communications system as a result of PTCL privatisation early last year.
Interestingly, the ministry of labour and manpower, which is responsible for country’s workforce, was never consulted during the process of development of the VSS agreed to by the ministries of information technology, finance and privatisation with the PTCL management – Etisalat of UAE.
Some members of the CCOP protested during the meeting for bypassing the labour ministry and others expressed concern regarding rights of the contract workers of the PTCL, a senior government official confirmed.
The record suggests that the government has “projected to cost Rs34.858 billion, assuming that 60 per cent of the employees would avail this package.” The share of government of Pakistan will be Rs17.429 billion to be paid out of privatisation proceeds on actual basis, audited and confirmed by the ministries of privatisation and IT.
Under the sales purchase agreement and shareholders agreement, the management had been given the ‘right by the government in April 2006 to offer voluntary retirement or departure to the employees and the GOP was committed to pay 50 per cent of gross expenses.”
However, the government will honour its commitment of sharing 50 per cent cost of VSS towards those employees who opt for the scheme within two months of its announcement.
The prime minister also instructed the ministry of information technology to ensure that employees opting VSS do not join the PTCL again on fresh contracts.
All regular PTCL employees are eligible for the VSS scheme, but the PTCL management reserves the legal right to accept or reject any application without any explanation.
Although, both the government and the PTCL management continue to claim that the scheme would be totally voluntary, agreed to with the CBA union and that nobody would be forced to leave the company, most of the employees contacted by Dawn suggest that an environment of uncertainty has been created to volunteer their consent. They said after adjustment of their loans and other liabilities, most of the employees would take home negligible amounts to survive.
The VSS package envisages a severance pay for BPS-16 and below workers at the rate of length of service multiplied by six up to a maximum of 120 basic pays or moths of service remaining multiplied by 1.5, whichever is lower.
For officials of BPS-17 and above, the severance pay would be equal to length of service multiplied by four and up to a maximum of 90 basic pays or months of service remaining multiplied by 1.5, whichever is lower.
In addition, all the employees of grade 16 and below and less than the age of 55 years would also be paid a separation bonus of Rs300,000 per head for less than 10 years of service and Rs450,000 per head for service between 10 and 20 years. Moreover, all employees with less than 20 years of service would be given other benefit cost payout of Rs220,000 for grade 16 and below and 1.5 basic per year for 10 years.
All employees would also be paid leave encashment for up to 96 days of emoluments for less than 20 years of service and up to 180 days for more than 20 years of service.
The annual increments will also be included in the final VSS settlement and the employees with a minimum 20 years service would be paid gross pension calculated with addition of five years and increased by 7.5 per cent for all employees while net pension and commutation would be based on enhanced gross pension.
The sources said the management will distribute option forms to all the employees on a 100 per cent basis with a deadline of 60 days to respond after which no request would be entertained. Likewise, request once made would not be allowed to be withdrawn.Meanwhile, the PTCL has signed a memorandum with Technical and Vocational Training Authority (TEVTA) for imparting technical and vocational training to the employees who would be opting for the VSS package.
