The Ceylon Petroleum Common Workers’ Union says that it was proposed long ago to change the weekly fuel quota ending day from Sunday to Tuesday but it was actually delayed by the subject Minister.

In a press release, the union assures they responsibly state that they had continued to work overtime on Sundays on the insistence of the minister.

“Our officials as well as employees had requested to stop the Sunday work… The former managing director has also tried to stop this on several occasions, but we reiterate that this was prevented by the intervention of the minister. This is due to the irrational fear that there will be fuel queues on Mondays if deliveries were stopped on Sundays,” they say.

However, the minister himself recently said that the decision to end the quota on Tuesdays had led to cutting down a considerable amount of costs in the form of overtime pay.

By stating this, the minister is hinting that the workers had worked on Sundays in a bid to secure extra overtime and we vehemently condemn this attempt to instigate public hate against the petroleum workers, it further notes.