Govt. service executive officers to launch 24-hour token strike on Feb.27

About 15, 000 government service executive officers are to launch a 24-hour countrywide token strike on February 27 as a mark of protest against two Acts that has resulted in an increase in lawyers’ salary scales by 300 per cent.

Speaking to the media today, Secretary of the All Island Service Executive Officers’ Joint Committee H. A. L. Udayasiri said the enactment of Acts 6/2006 and 3/2016 had resulted in an imbalanced salary scales among state sector executive officers.

“The government has said there is no need to increase the salary scales of other state sector employees except the one for lawyers. The government removes our facilities such as vehicle permits and pension entitlements and then they take this decision,” he said.

“We request the government to abolish these Acts which increase lawyers' salaries only, revert to the pensions scheme which was available in 2016 and to allocate facilities for us to obtain vehicle permits as well. We made several requests to the government but no one ever listened to us. The increased salary scales of lawyers should be removed or that circular should apply to other state sector employees as well,” he said.

By this act, the government is planning to dilute the state sector, Mr.Udayasiri said.

Therefore, the union had decided to launch a 24-hour token strike countrywide and if the government does not respond to our demands, the strike would develop into a massive trade union action, he said.

Mr. Udayasiri added that 17 associations would be joining the token strike and that the Government Medical Officers’ Association (GMOA) too had promised to show its support. (Chaturanga Samarawickrama)