Pakistan Hosiery Manufacturers & Exporters Association (PHMA) on Monday sought intervention of Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf to end transporters' strike in Karachi, which has disrupted timely delivery of export consignments causing huge loss to the national exchequer.
The United Goods Transporter Alliance (UGTA), Karachi Goods Carrier Association (KGCA) and Transporters of Goods Association (TGA) went on strike from January 31, at Pakistan International Container Terminal (PICT) and Karachi International Container Terminal (KICT).
Transporters' strike completely disrupted shipment of a large number of export goods, resulting in huge loss to the exporters as well as the country, maintained a letter of PHMA sent to the Prime Minister here on Monday. Javed Balwani, Central Chairman of PHMA, maintained in the letter that the Association had taken up the matter with the Secretary Commerce on Thursday, January 31, in a meeting at Islamabad requesting him to help resolve the crucial issue. The Secretary Commerce assured of resolving the matter but unfortunately it is in limbo and the strike is going on till to date.
In the letter it is further maintained that in the recent past, the transporters' strike continued for 11 days, causing huge loss to exporters, many of whom were compelled to send their goods paying exorbitant airfreight to fill commitments with the buyers. At that time too, the PHMA had requested the government to intervene and the matter was finally resolved.
However, when the strike ended last time, there was a huge backlog of containers scheduled for the ships which had sailed away and this extra load was carried forward for many days with serious impact. Seriousness of the situation demands that the issues of the strike, causing huge loss not only to exporters but to the country, may be resolved at the earliest, maintained PHMA letter sent to Prime Minister.
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