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THE Banking, Insurance and General Workers' Union (BIGWU) has condemned the firing of hundreds of Unemployment Relief Programme (URP) workers, calling it unjust and draconian.

It also called on new URP programme manager Feeroz Khan to take responsibility if there are "ghosts" in the programme and resign immediately.

Minister of Rural Development and Local Government Khadijah Ameen, under whom the URP programme falls, said the government is restructuring the programme to root out systemic corruption. Ameen said the firing of some URP workers was a normal procedure following a change of government after an election