BANNU: A total of 538 employees of the North Waziristan Health Department have appealed to the government to release their salaries withheld for the past 18 months and reinstate them at their respective hospitals.

Addressing a press conference at Bannu Press Club, the affected employees said they had been wrongly declared ghost employees or residents of foreign countries, resulting in the suspension of their salaries.

The employees, including Malik Farooq Khan Dawar, Nazar Hussain, Akbar Khan and Inamullah, said they had been cleared following a physical verification conducted on the orders of senior civil and military authorities. According to them, the secretary of the Health Department in Peshawar confirmed their status through the verification process.

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Despite being cleared, the employees said their salaries had not been restored, leaving them in severe financial difficulties for the past 18 months.

They expressed gratitude to the senior civil and military authorities for taking notice of their case and facilitating the physical verification process.

The employees urged Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Sohail Afridi, the provincial health minister, the health secretary and other relevant authorities to immediately release their pending salaries, remove their names from the list of ghost employees and restore their duties at their respective hospitals.