Troubles at Pakistan Telecommunication Ltd.

Troubles at Pakistan Telecommunication Ltd.

The Pakistan government has decided to privatize the Pakistan Telecommunication Ltd. by inviting bids for a controlling 26 percent stake. The proposal is worth a massive USD 1.5 Billion and eight international telecom companies have shown their interest. However, the workers in the company are against this move to privatize.

The latest news in says that the police has already arrested hundreds of Pakistan Telecommunication Ltd. workers who called a strike to protest against this move by the government. The bidding process is expected to begin in a week’s time. Now, Troops and the army’s technical staff has been deployed at key PTCL installations across Pakistan to keep the services running.

The workers are afraid that they would lose their jobs after the privatization and the leaders of the union of workers have apparently gone underground after the arrests began. They had earlier threatened to block the communication systems in Pakistan, which would have resulted in a crippled telecom situation in the country.

Police raided locations in Islamabad, Karachi, Rawalpindi and other major cities of the country looking for these workers and leaders involved in calling the strike and the government would now be taking bids from the telecom giants from around the world on 18th of this month.