Labourers want taxes on food items, POL slashed

NOWSHERA: Provincial president of Mutahidda Labour Federation Muhammad Iqbal on Monday said that the prevailing skyrocketing price hike and huge taxes on essential items and petroleum products had made life miserable for the poor labourers while the government had become a silent spectator.

Speaking at a press conference, he said that provincial and federal governments should increase the monthly wages and the Employees Old-Age Benefits Institution pension in proportion to the existing price hike and inflation in the country.

Flanked by the federation’s central president Wali Muhammad Khan, Ajmal Khan, Imdad Hussain Paracha and others, the labourers’ leader alleged that the government and the industrialists were hand in glove, who were involved in closing down the industrial units under a well-hatched conspiracy in the province.

He said that the country was under heavy loans and the poor were now made to bear the brunt but the influential figures had siphoned off their huge assets to foreign countries.The labour leader said the government should bring back the laundered money to get the country rid of the foreign loans and spend the money on development and industrialisation to create employment opportunities for the youths.

Muhammad Iqbal urged the government to abolish taxes on petroleum products and essential food items so the poor could manage their routine life.He said that labourers had played a pivotal role in the development of the country but every successive government had always ignored them.Muhammad Iqbal urged the government to take proper steps for safeguarding the rights of labourers and factory workers to improve their economic condition.