Joint body to redress difference with PHMA: EOBI official

Employee's Old Age Benefits Institution (EOBI) will take Pakistan Hosiery Manufacturers & Exporters Association (PHMA) into confidence before issuing notices while a joint committee has also been constituted to redress the mutual differences, said Director EOBI South Fareed Ahmad.
Addressing the PHMA members in a meeting here today, he said that we are morally, religiously and legally bound to protect and facilitate the retired workers who had sacrificed their lives for the uplift of the country. He assured that Government departments including EOBI are not supposed to work in isolation. "We will take all stakeholders into confidence," he said and hoped that particularly employers should also cooperate with them. He said that government is fully aware of the slump in local & international business, but despite of all these factors, we have to take care of the retired workers.
Earlier Mian Naeem Ahmad chairman PHMA said that cost of doing business has increased manifold due to the Government policies. He said that value added textile sector is contributing its role in national exports in addition to providing jobs to millions of workers. He said that the declining trend in export has added burden on the national economy and we must provide necessary incentives to the export sector in addition to introducing proactive export friendly policies.
He said that the export of value added sector has declined from 3.2 billion dollars to 2.5 billion dollars. He said that in this scenario the Government institutions are creating harassment among exporters by sending them series of notices. Mian Naeem Ahmed said that government should merge all taxes, duties and contribution etc and introduce "one window operation" for the onetime payment of all dues.
He said that this will save precious time of employers which could be well utilized to further enhance production for exports. He also quoted "self assessment scheme" which was included in previous tenures. He said that present government should reintroduce this self assessment scheme as it will help government to extract maximum contribution while industrialists will also feel themselves comfortable due to the non interference of the government departments.