Health dept employees stage demo against non-payment of salaries

FAISALABAD: The contract employees of the Health Department on Friday staged a demonstration at Chowk Zila Council against the non-payment of their salaries for the last three months.

The Lady Health Workers also participated in the protest. The protesters chanted slogans against the local Health Department authorities for non-payment of their salaries and other dues and threatened to close down all the Basic Health Units in Faisalabad if their salaries and wages were not paid.

A spokesman for the protesting Health Department employees told media that their annual contract had been expired on June 30, 2019, yet they were performing their duties on the assurance of the local Health authorities that their contract would be renewed soon. However, he added, they were not paid for the last three months.

Group discussion: The Policy Research Institute of Market Economy Institute (PRIME), an economic think tank, in collaboration with the UN Habitat and the UNDP on Friday organised a group discussion on the topic of local economic development.

The event was hosted by the Faisalabad Municipal Corporation. A number of participants from Municipal Corporation, different departments, business community, civil society and academia participated in the session. Commissioner Mehmood Javed Bhatti presided the session while FDA DG Amir Aziz, Wasa MD Faqir Muhammad Ch, Local Govt Director Maria Tariq, MCF Chief Officer Sardar Naseer, Prof Dr Sofia Anwar and other officers attended the event.

Joint Executive Director of the PRIME Zia Banday, UN Habitat Program Manager Javed Ali Khan, representative of the UND Umar Hayat Malik and Urban Economist of Urban Unit Punjab Dr Ghulam Mohiyuddin gave presentations on local economic development and city development planning.

Commissioner Javed Mehmood Bhatti welcomed the participants of the group discussion on the behalf of the Municipal Corporation Faisalabad and said that integrated efforts were vital for accelerating the pace of economic and urban development. He showed his commitment relating to the local economic and said that local economic unit for undertaking economic development of Faisalabad City would be established in this regard. He emphasized upon the officers of the different department for taking benefits of the economic and urban development experts for achieving the targets of local economic development. After his welcome address, there were talks of facets of LED by UNDP, UN Habitat and Urban Unit, Punjab.

All the speakers highlighted the importance of the LED on sustainable development of Pakistan.

It was mentioned during the talk that Pakistan was a large country that requires economic empowerment for a prudent planning and generation of economic activities at cities level. Zia Banday gave detailed presentation on detailed activities undertaken by the LED ambit by multi-lateral and think tanks.

He also mentioned the engagement of the PRIME and its partners in developing economic development units for 10 largest cities of Pakistan.