KARACHI: Pakistan Customs Appraisers who went on a strike after suspension of one of their colleague suspended their strike until 4 p.m after negotiations with a two-member team of high officials comprising Focal Person Deputy collector Shah Faisal and Deputy Collector Appraisement West Ghulam Nabi Kumboh.
Earlier the work at port came to a standstill as one of the appraisers Sher Khan was suspended by the Collector Customs for not pursuing a case pertaining to West in which he was nominated as Investigation Officer. Later he was transferred to Port Muhammad Bin Qasim and upon his transfer, he handed over the file.
The other case, which irked the appraisers, was action against Examiner Ghulam Abbas for not testing a suspected consignment on his device. He was asked to explain that why he did not performed the test from the kit available with him and for failure in submitting the report to the Collector. The Appraisers and Examiners maintain that sample was sent to the Laboratory on the orders of Assistant Collector and therefore action should have been taken against the Assistant Collector and not the examiner who just followed the instructions.
Another cause of protest was workload and doing away with weekly holiday at Appraisement West. The higher officials approached Senior Vice President of Pakistan Customs Appraisement Officers Association, principal appraiser Shafiullah and Secretary General Raja Waseem, Appraising Officer. They assured that demands of the associations would be met after which the strike was suspended till 4 pm. The officers were told that if their demands were not met by 4 p.m work would again stop at the port.