Arthur Schopenhauer, 19th Century German Philosopher has remarked: "All truth passes through three stages. First it is ridiculed. Second it is violently opposed. Third it is accepted as being self-evident." Promulgation and handling of Labour Law during the past four years show that when pseudo populist labour laws are passed in haste, and saner elements of society object to these laws, they were initially ridiculed, by claiming those objecting were creating hindrance in conferring rights to the labour class by democratically elected government.
Subsequent consequences are one of guarded repentance. Retaining a major portion of labour legislation by the Centre especially where huge financial contributions made by employers exclusively for welfare of workers is concerned and administration of Workers Welfare Fund Ordinance 1971, Companies Profit (Workers Participation) Act 1968, Employees Old Age Benefits Act, 1976 and Industrial Relations Ordinance 2011 by the Centre and directing administration of these institutions not by dissolved Ministry of Labour but Inter-Provincial Coordination Division is presently unfortunately violently defended by those in power. Those seeking protection of 18th Constitutional Amendment are ridiculed for very obvious reasons. Welfare of workers is not the real reason of these retaining of the "milching cow" institutions. Misappropriation of funds is the real motive of diverting the administration of these amounts and funds to the Ministry at the Centre. Welfare of the working class finds no priority in any of these sinister motives. It is greed, which is the motive. Greed to wipe away the accumulated funds created under the above laws. Greed to create institutions like the National Industrial Relations Commission in negation to the 18th Constitutional Amendment and the principle laid down by the Apex Court in the case of Air League reported in PLJ 2011 SC 771 to register industry-wise trade unions only to subvert bona fide genuine trade unions of the workers in the Province and declaring Collective Bargaining Agents or Collective Bargaining Units, thus frustrating trade unions and its growth in the four provinces.
The government promulgated the Sacked Employees (Reinstatement) Ordinance 2009 aimed at reinstating employees removed between November 1993 and December 1998 in all corporation service or autonomous and semi-autonomous bodies with payments of back benefits for certain periods in instalments. This law ignored the fact that Labour Laws are restricted and confined to workmen, whereas this law is open-ended.
Those who had earlier challenged unsuccessfully their claim for reinstatement in the Courts also derived benefit under this law. So also employees who had not challenged their removal from service in courts of law or those who had cleared their dues after their removal also reaped this windfall. Nearly 18,000 employees of the OGDC, Pakistan Petroleum Ltd, Sui Southern Gas Company (SSGC), Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) to name a few derived this dolling out of national wealth with gusto.
Amongst those benefiting are employees even lacking technical background and relevant background to produce intended results. Frustration at the promulgation of this law after a lapse of two years is now evident from the extract from an article of Abdul Rasheed Azad, reported in Business Recorder of 27th December, 2011, which is reproduced, with respect, as follows: The Sui Northern Gas Pipelines (SNGPL) has submitted to the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (Ogra) that the reinstated employees, as per federal government directives, lack technical knowledge and relevant background to produce intended results as per Ogra timelines.
Official documents available with Business Recorder show that the SNGPL has approached Ogra for approval of Rs 555 million on account of salary arrears to the sacked employees of the company in 1998-99, during Nawaz Sharif's regime. According to the documents, SNGPL is making concerted efforts by putting them through various formal training sessions as well as on-job training. Resultantly, some improvements in various fields had been witnessed.
Tangible results, however, would take time, for which the petitioner is endeavouring to utilise their services to the best of their ability. Ogra, however, has questioned SNGPL's assessment by pointing out that before their termination they were appointed against suitable positions by the company's management itself after due diligence and scrutiny.
The documents say: "The authority admits the fact that the above employees were reinstated pursuant to compliance with the directives of the federal government, in accordance with Sacked Employees Ordinance, 2009. The authority, however, notes that these employees, before their termination, were appointed against suitable positions by the company's management itself, surely after due diligence and scrutiny.
The authority is of the concerted opinion that desired results can possibly be achieved from reinstated employees, provided the management eagerly undertake appropriate measures for re-training of these employees." The authority also noted concerns over the efficiency of the SNGPL towards some critical area, particularly Unaccounted for Gas (UFG) losses of 15 percent.
However, Ogra claims that it is adopting a generous approach in allowing cost on account of HR for last year and notes that "Ogra in view of the above, allow 50 percent expenditure on account of sacked employees, amounting to Rs 278 million on provisional basis at this time, subject to improvement consequent to effective utilisation of these employees.
The same will, however, be comprehensively viewed at the time of the FRR and the petitioner must be able to demonstrate enhanced utilisation of the reinstated employees at that time, in terms of concrete measurable outputs". In 1998, the Nawaz government had sacked 2814 workers, who had been hired by the Benazir Bhutto regime, to work for the SNGPL in 1995-1996 on the grounds that the jobs were allocated on the basis of political affiliations and not on merit. After returning to power in 2008, the PPP government ordered reinstatement of nearly 18,000 sacked employees from the Oil and Gas Development Company (OGDC), Pakistan Petroleum Limited, Sui Northern Gas Pipelines (SNGPL), Sui Southern Gas Company (SSGC), Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) and the Federal Directorate of Education (FDE).
The government nonetheless continues to operate PIA, Pakistan Steel, Pakistan Railways, Pakistan Electric Supply Company, Sui Southern Gas and Sui Northern Gas to name a few incurring annual loss of Rs 650 billion in 2011 alone with the very obvious reason of loot and plunder. The recent article by Mansoor Ahmed in English daily "The News" of December 29, 2011 is a sad reflection and analysis of these losses, which could be avoided forthwith. With respect, extract of this article is reproduced verbatim: "The losses of public sector enterprises peaked in 2011 while their performance reached the lowest ebb in Pakistan's history, threatening the economic viability of the country. The country is losing over Rs 600 billion per year due to inefficiencies of the state owned enterprises at a time when the government does not have resources for education, health and social services. The loss-making entities are Pepco, PIA, Pakistan Steel, Railways and many others.
The Railways is expected to incur a loss of Rs 35 billion in the fiscal year 2011-12. Since the current government came to power in 2008 the Railways had retired 104 of 204 trains in a country larger than Britain and Germany combined. It relies on handouts of Rs 2.5 billion a month just to pay salaries and pensions. "In the absence of reforms, there is a vast probability of misappropriation of the financial resources provided to this entity", the SBP said.
"During FY10 and FY11 alone, the government has provided funding to cover Railway losses to the extent of 0.2 percent of the GDP, the SBP report further revealed. Investigations into the multi-billions rupees organisation also revealed that more than 10,000 acres of land was owned by Pakistan Railways on prime locations across all four provinces. A report compiled by the National Assembly's Standing Committee on Railways and presented to the Public Accounts Committee stated that the revenue potential to the land in alleged possession of land grabbers could reach around Rs 10 billion annually.
It is pertinent to note that the current infrastructure of Railways is worth several billion dollars. It is a pity that we are not benefiting from this excellent setup. The Railways is the main mode of goods transport facilities as Railways have dried up, putting immense pressure on road transport. Railways is the cheapest mode of goods transportation because the infrastructure laid down is free of hassle and the capacity to carry goods in numerous wagons in one go is enormous.
The inefficiencies and incompetence in the Railways has reached such a limit that in 2011 most of its passenger load has gone to road transport. Comfortable buses ply on the Karachi-Lahore route to take passengers to their destinations on time. It is because of this abdication of goods and passengers' responsibilities that 82 percent of the railways revenue is used for salaries and staff benefits. By contrast, staff expenditure comprises 57 percent of the revenue base in the Indian Railways.
PIA created new dubious records in 2011. The airlines is managed to run with 21 fleets out of the total 39 as less than half of its planes were grounded on the unavailability of engines and different accessories. Its punctuality record reached its lowest ebb in 2011 as its punctuality was 65.5 percent in nine months of the current year. Its punctuality was at 81.5 percent in 2007, 79.4 percent in 2008, 73.1 percent in 2009, 68 percent in 2010. This depicts the constant deterioration in the performance of the national air carrier.
PIA continues to loose its passengers and its earnings but its expenses have been mounting at an accelerated pace, increasing speedily the losses upto Rs 116 billion by the second half of 2011. Passengers have stopped using PIA on international routes due to its inefficient services. Most of them use other airlines by first going to Dubai and then catching the flights of other airlines to reach their destinations on time. The national carrier always makes profit from Hajj operations since its inception but in the year 2011, unfortunately, it ran its overall flight operations in loss with a penalty of 10,000 riyals imposed by the Saudi Aviation Authority on the continuous flight operations delays that hurt passengers at the airport.
The Pakistan International Airlines employs the highest number of workers per aircraft, which is 514 and in the currently operating aircrafts, the number of workers per aircraft increased to above 1000. The PIA bosses are not bothered about the way the airline is bleeding.
Its staff recently renegotiated room charges with a Dubai hotel, which was accepted and conveyed to the PIA administration by the hotel. PIA, however, is still paying higher charges to the Dubai hotel. After negotiations, the PIA should have saved approximately Rs 8.5 million per annum, according to calculations. In the past two months of 2011, about 1,197 flights were cancelled that cost Rs 413 million to PIA.
As far as the Pakistan Steel Mills is concerned, it has been out of production for several months due to want of raw material. The government has provided Rs 6 billion to the entity to import raw material, which is on the way. A total of Rs 30 billion has already been doled out to the PSM to cover its financial losses.
The gas distribution companies managed to avoid losses but their distribution losses increased from 3 percent in 2007 to 10 percent in 2011. The increased losses translated into billions of rupees. The Pakistan Electric Supply Company is incurring a loss of Rs one billion per day. This is despite the fact that the government has increased electricity tariffs at the rate of 2 percent per month during 2011. In addition, consumers are paying fuel adjustment charges because Pepco is operating its most inefficient plants, while the efficient IPPs have been constrained due to huge dues that the Pepco owes them.
The government claims that it has added 2,500 MW electricity in the past four years but the global power statistics issued by British Petroleum reveal that power production in Pakistan was 10 percent lower than in 2008. The loss of PEPCO power distribution companies are on the rise while the revenue collection of the billed amount is declining. The power losses in the Sukkur Electric Supply Company exceed 40 percent and the collection of the remaining billed amount is only 59 percent. The power theft is higher than 30 percent in Peshawar, Quetta, Hyderabad and the revenue collection is the same range as in Sukkur."
Realisation as to the negative role of certain trade unions to frustrate the efforts of government to reduce losses in loss-making government organizations is reflected when the President of the country in his address on the eve of the 4th death anniversary of the former prime minister of Pakistan even alleged that unions even frustrated the attempt of government aimed at code sharing plan with a foreign airline and then based on this belated realisation the Prime Minister has now reportedly even rejected the PIA Business Plan.
At the same time, the government has announced that twelve percent of government shares worth Rs 100 billion will be transferred free to half a million workers of state-owned enterprises (SOEs). Dolling out public money in SOEs freely is not a wise commercial decision. Employees in the private sector can now claim shares without payment, thus adding further misery to the crawling private sector, already suffering from lack of electricity, gas, law and order, lack of well planned Monetary, Fiscal Policy and no vision aimed at industrialization of this country to feed the population of 190 million people.
Labour Laws do apply to the PIA and other state-owned enterprises. The PIA is suffering a loss of Rs 70.5 million per day. Neither non-core functions of PIA are being outsource as is presently done by successful private sector organisations. Foreign Consultants like the International Finance Corporation (IFC) not aware of the socio-cultural-economic problems, nor the trend of our judiciary cannot assist the government to overcome its problem of which the labour problem is one major contributor.
This problem is the creation of government itself. If private sector organisations can overcome labour problems there is no reason to doubt that state-owned enterprises cannot bring about the same results. Unfortunately there is lack of will, sincerity and honesty of purpose. Loot and plunder of the state-owned institutions, often manned by ill-educated, disabled and mentally retarded, retired and corrupt henchmen appointed on the basis of political influence, cannot solve labour unrest in our country.
In fact they will ensure in continuation of chaos as survival and existence of such persons depends on these failing institutions surviving on taxpayers' money. Justice Oliver Wendell Homes in case reported in 220 US 373, 411 (1911) has remarked: "...the most enlightened judicial policy is to let people manage their own business in their own way."
Benazir Employees Stock Option Scheme shares be not distributed for free. Employees be given option to purchase the shares, but on the share face value, to give them a feeling of participation in the industry. It is a misnomer to believe that if shares are distributed for free, the beneficiaries will vote for the present party in power in the next elections. To obtain a few votes, the wealth of the country is being distributed for free. Rigging of the forthcoming elections has thus commenced unnoticed.
(To be continued)