KHYBER: The World Health Organisation (WHO) has issued termination notices to its 73 union council operation officers in Khyber tribal district, asking them to immediately cease their duties.

Sources in the polio eradication programme, executed under the auspices of the WHO, told Dawn that those officers were hired on contract for the community-based vaccination programme to drop anti-polio drops to the maximum number of children and address the rising vaccination refusals in Khyber and Peshawar districts.

They said that the notice didn’t mention any reason for termination, but it was believed that a shortage of funds led to the WHO’s move.

Official sources said that with anti-polio campaigns planned for Peshawar, Khyber and other districts amid rising polio incidence, the services of vaccinators were still required.

They said the notices surprised most of the union council operation officers as they were not given any prior intimation about termination.

Sources in the WHO claimed that the terminated officers were not regular staff members, whose layoffs came due to the non-sanctioning of further funds for the project.

The sudden termination has outraged polio officers and their family members, who, along with some elders of Kukikhel tribe in Jamrud, have demanded that the WHO immediately reverse its decision as the job was the only source of livelihood for those officers.

They contended that Khyber tribal district stood in close proximity to Afghanistan from where poliovirus could easily travel to Pakistan, so termination of over 70 polio officers by the World Health Organisation would put the health of thousands of local children at risk.

The argued that they had diligently performed their duties for the last 15 years and some of their colleagues even laid down their lives in the line of duty, but still their services were terminated without assigning any valid reason.

Their family members and tribal elders warned that if the terminated officers weren’t restored, the residents would stop their cooperation for the polio vaccination campaign and would boycott the campaign.

Published in Dawn, December 15th, 2024