KATHMANDU, March 17: Although the padlock at the Nepal Association of Tour and Travel Agents (NATTA)’s office was removed on Tuesday, the office was padlocked again on Wednesday.
The padlock, which was placed by the Joint Tourism Trade Union Forum at NATTA’s Secretariat with various demands including pay hike, insurance cover etc was removed on Tuesday by the representatives of the ward office, police, CDO office and other organizations. However, on Wednesday, six organizations including Integrated Center of Trade Unions, Nepal Trade Union, Samajwadi Trade Union again padlocked NATTA Secretariat.
Chaos, united
NATTA’s Senior Vice President Pramod Dahal said that the association is not an official organization to increase the salary and requested the protestors to go to the Ministry of Labor and related agencies. He said that the Ministry of Labor, Departments and related agencies have the right to decide on salary increase and the association is only an umbrella organization to enforce the policies and decisions set by the state or the law.
Mentioning that NATTA is a non-profit NGO registered at the CDO office, Dahal said, "NATTA is an umbrella organization of travel agencies." We only have the right to request the members who are affiliated with the organization to implement the policies and rules determined by the government.''
The padlock which was removed after the decision of the NATTA Working Committee arguing that the incident had sent a negative message at home and abroad about the tourism business, which is about to resume after the global pandemic. However, six different trade unions padlocked NATTA’s office again.
Meanwhile, Prashant Dhungana, president of the Integrated Tourism Workers' Union Nepal (ITWUN), mentioned that since NATTA is an objective union of the Federation of Nepalese Chambers of Commerce and Industry, the wages of tourism workers should be increased. "If NATTA is not an employer association, why did they accept the demands repeatedly? Why didn't they say no in the beginning? Why call for informal talks many times?” he asked.
