Siraj for end to exploitation of workers

LAHORE: Jamaat-e-Islami Ameer Senator Sirajul Haq has said that there is no mechanism for the workers welfare in the country as the entire system aimed at the protection of the elite. Addressing workers and porters at Lahore Railway Station on the Labour Day, he called for an end to the exploitation of workers.
He demanded workers’ share in the industrial production, registration of those working in hotels, workshops, cottage industries, vendors and domestic servants, payment of minimum wages to them, besides lawful facilities of education and health be provided to them.
Sirajul Haq had a lunch with the porters at the Lahore Railway Station and addressed a workers rally at Shere Bengal Colony, Ferozewala. Stating that the government was unable to implement its minimum wages laws, the JI chief called for raise in the EOBI pensions to Rs8,000 in accordance with the announcement in the 2012-13 budget, and payment of arrears.
He said cheating was going on in the name of privatisation and corruption to the tune of Rs3,000 billion had already been done under the cover of privatisation. The government, he said, wanted to sell out important institutions, but the JI would not allow the rulers to go ahead with such mass killing of the workers.
Thousands of torture camps were working in the country in the name of contract system where the exploitation of workers and labourers was going on. The government had not been able to enforce its decision regarding minimum wages and daily wages. The workers were not paid over time.
The JI chief said development works were completed only in elite areas as the slums and labour colonies remained neglected. He called for exposing the highups at the back of the corrupt officers and prompt legal action against them.