LG employees urge govt to solve salary, pension issues

MANSEHRA: The office-bearers of Local Government Employees Union on Friday demanded the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa caretaker government to address salary and pension issues faced by employees of defunct district councils across the province.

“The government had abolished district councils and merged their employees into tehsil municipal administrations of the respective areas but employees of defunct district councils are still deprived of salary and the pension,” Mohammad Hussain Tanoli, the president of the Local Government Employees Union, told reporters in Oghi.

Flanked by the other office-bearers, he said that the government should take prompt measures to address the financial issues faced by the local government departments.

“The employees and financial affairs of the district council are handed over to tehsil municipal administrations, which has triggered serious financial issues of pensioners and surplus staffers,” Tanoli said.

He said the provincial government was yet to hand over the Account-IV of the defunct district councils, which had further complicated problems for employees.

“The defunct district councils in Hazara division had an amount of Rs110 million each to deal with the pension and other financial affairs of the employees but that amount is yet to be transferred to the accounts of the tehsil municipal administrations,” Tanoli said.

The president of the Local government employees union also demanded the caretaker chief minister to ensure the transfers of district governments’ frozen accounts to tehsil municipal administrations to settle pension and salary issues in Hazara division and the rest of the province.