SWABI: Four members of the Swabi council resigned in protest against the former acting district nazim’s failure to provide equal development funds to their union council, sources in the district government told Dawn on Monday.

They said those who handed over their resignations to district nazim Zahid Khan included Bakhtiar Ali, Asad Bacha, Afsar Zeb and Qaisar Khan, all belonging to Awami National Party.

The plea adopted by them was that former acting nazim, Hassan Khan, failed to equally distribute funds due to which they failed to meet the expectations of their voters, said the sources.

It was not immediately clear as to whether the district nazim would accept their resignations or not. However, it was learnt that the district nazim was expected to hold talks with them on Tuesday (today).

Meanwhile, insiders said as only two and a half months of the district government tenure remained, the members had no interest in its affairs, and that was the reason the four councillors had tendered resignations.

COMPENSATION SOUGHT: The affected people of the Gulf War on Monday warned if they failed to get assistance according to the UN announcement they would stage demonstrations in Islamabad and also observe a hunger strike.

Speaking at a meeting in Zaida city, they pointed out that the UN had sanctioned assistance for the Gulf War-affected people, and under the plan, every affected person was to get Rs100,000 US dollars, but despite lapse of so many years they were still awaiting financial assistance.

They appealed to Prime Minister Imran Khan to play his due role in the matter.

WORKERS WELFARE: Pakistan Workers Federation (PWF) leaders said on Monday that of the total 10 million workers only 3.2 million were registered with Employees Old-Age Benefit Institution.

Zahoor Awan, PWF’s central general secretary and other leaders, told reporters that the government should take practical steps for workers welfare.

They said they planned to launch a campaign for social security of destitute workers in Sindh and Balochistan. They said they had run a result-oriented campaign in 2018 on social security in Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Islamabad.

Mr Awan said the campaign would help ensure provision of social security to labourers, adequate facilities to them by institutions concerned, and upholding the labour national and international laws.

Published in Dawn, March 19th, 2019