Employees of the Embilipitya Paper Corporation have not been paid their salaries for the past two months and their EPF and ETF contributions have not been made for the entire year, trade union officials said.
They said this vital corporation was in such a big mess that even its electricity supplies had been cut off due to non-payment of bills.
The union officials said Sri Lanka could save millions of rupees if this corporation was properly managed and more quality paper was produced locally as plenty of raw material was available. But for the past few years, successive governments have allowed the corporation to go reeling.
Responding to these charges, Corporation Chairman Siripala Amarasinghe said they have sought Rs 86 million from the Treasury to pay the salaries and were waiting cabinet approval for it.
He said most of the problems would be resolved within the next two weeks.
This corporation has about 250 permanent employees with another 400 working on casual or temporary basis.
Union officials said those who were in the forefront of the campaign for the revival of the corporation and the payment of salaries for employees had even received death threats from vested interest whose agenda was apparently to kill the corporation. |
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