Foreign airhostesses working for PIA to be sacked

State Minister for Defence Ali Asjad Malhi has informed the Senate that 45 foreign airhostesses who were working with Pakistan International Airlines (PIA), would be sacked soon.

Islamabad, Aug 16 : State Minister for Defence Ali Asjad Malhi has informed the Senate that 45 foreign airhostesses who were working with Pakistan International Airlines (PIA), would be sacked soon.

Malhi said that the PIA had employed these airhostesses between January 2005 and September 2006.

He said they were paid Rs 170,767 per month, besides other allowances, while their Pakistani colleagues were getting only Rs 13,000 per month as basic salary.

Malhi was quoted by the Daily Times as saying that after receiving a question from the Senate, he got to know of this discrimination and instantly ordered cancellation their contracts.

The Government would ask the PIA top brass why it had employed foreign airhostesses when the organisation is already running into losses and there was unemployment in the country.

PIA's has been over-staffed for the past 10-20 years that had crippled the organisation's finances, because of too much salary with little or no work being done by a large number of extra employees.

The impact of 2006 salary hike, increased cost of leased aircraft and higher maintenance cost of PIA fleet increased the overall operating expenses by 19%. Consequently, the airline suffered an operating loss of Rs 2.5 billion in the first quarter.

PIA operates scheduled services to 46 destinations throughout Asia, the Middle East, Europe and North America, as well as an extensive domestic network linking 24 destinations.

PIA is the only state-owned airline in the country since independence, and at present has 42 aircrafts in its fleet.

ANI