PESHAWAR: Thousands of workers went on strike on Wednesday against the Water and Sanitation Services Peshawar, a sanitation company, for what they called not honouring the agreement made with the government employees prior to setting up of the company.

Around 6,000 sanitation staffers working in Peshawar would also stage a sit-in at Bacha Khan Chowk on Thursday, Naveed Malik , the chairman of the employees union told Dawn.

Of the protesting staffers, 3,000 employees work under the WSSP and the remaining are associated with the three towns. They threatened to take to streets on Friday if WSSP failed to honour its agreement about the service structure of the sanitation staff and healthinsurance.

As the sanitation staff is on the strike, tons of garbage on the roads and streets couldn`t be lifted, a senior officer of the Town-1 told Dawn.

He said that cleanliness situation would be further deteriorated in the coming days if the employees continued their strike.

Mr Malik said that under the agreement, struck amongst WSSP, Town-1 and employees, WSSP would not have the authority to recruit sanitation staff. If WSSP was in need of sanitation staff, it would request Town-1 for the purpose, he said.

He said that under the agreement, Town-1 would recruit the employees and then deploy them in WSSP on deputation.

Mr Malik said that in violation of the agreement, WSSP started hiring sanitation staff on fixed pay scale on the retirement of the regular employees. Under the agreement, he said, employees on fixed pay scale couldn`t be hired on regular posts.

`The sanitation staff has been in correspondence with the administration of WSSP for the last three months but in vain. It finally compelled them to go on strike,` he said.

Mr Malik said that district nazim Mohammad Asim Khan also intervened in the matter but the high-ups of WSSP didn`t listen to him.

A senior official in Town-1 told Dawn that WSSP recently hired sweepers on fixed pay of Rs13,000 and a tubewell operator at Rs12,000 on the sanctioned posts in violation of the agreement.

Taimur Ahmad Shah, the spokesman for WSSP, when contacted for comments, said that the high-ups of the company would hold negotiations with the leaders of the protesting employees on Thursday. Hopefully the sanitation staff would call off strike after the meeting, he said.