It’s been two-and-a-half years that people’s representatives took charge of the local levels. However, these local units are still a dearth of over 20 thousand employees depriving service seekers of their amenities. A tale of six local bodies!
Bidhya Rai : Centre for Investigative journalism-Nepal
Saroj Bohara, 17, of Dhuli, Uttari Saipal rural municipality of Bajhang district walked for two days to reach Chainpur; the district headquarters, in an effort to get the recommendation for his citizenship certificate, in November.
Service seekers at the Chainpur-based Uttari Saipal Rural Municipality liaison office of Bajhang. Photo: Basanta Pratap Singh
However, to his surprise upon arrival, the rural municipality office was literally vacant. Neither the office bearers nor the people’s representatives were present in the office. He not only returned home empty-handed but spent around Rs 30,000 in his travel. “Our hopes of obtaining service at the door-steps and necessary facilities after the election of people’s representatives have been shattered. We are compelled to travel for two days to reach the district headquarters for minor official work,” complains Bohara.
Bohara’s statement is veracious as the office of the Uttari Saipal rural municipality mostly remains vacant. And oddly enough, a liaison or a contact office of the Saipal rural municipality has been set up at the district headquarters. This, in turn, has compelled people from rural areas, including Saipal to come to the district headquarters by walking three to five days solely for the purpose of minor work.
Says Rajendra Dhami, Chairperson of Uttari Saipal rural municipality, “We are stationed at the district headquarters regardless of our desire to provide services in the village due to lack of facilities such as the internet, banks, sufficient employees, and even post office.”
As a matter of fact, the northern Saipal rural municipality still faces staff crunch. The Ministry of Federal Affairs and General Administration has the vacancy of 19 employees in the municipalities. However, only eight employees are currently working in the municipality. The municipality lacks a chief administration officer. Non-Gazette first-class officer (Nayab Subba) Radha Krishna Joshi is working as Acting Chief Administrative Officer. Two among the five wards have secretaries. Says Joshi, “Due to insufficient staffers, we have hired employees to work on a contract.”
Development works have been adversely affected and service seekers are deprived of services due to the crunch of municipality staffers in Saipal. Around sixty percent of the project budget has been spent on travel to and from the municipality and district headquarters by people’s representatives and the office bearers of user committees. According to Basanta Bohara, a member of the user’s committee, the budget that has been allocated for the construction of a canal at ward-2 was spent on travel. Concurs Man Bahadur Bohara, chairperson of Kayakhola Laghu Hydropower Project, “The budget allocated for development projects are spent while traveling to and from Chainpur. Imagine, how can we operate our work this way?”
Service seekers in trouble
In Humla, Simkot rural municipality is facing a similar set of circumstances. A lack of staffers has left the municipality to be run by a single Chief Administrative Officer and two sixth grade government officers. Of the total eight wards in the rural municipality, only three have secretaries. This has resulted in the delay of the distribution of social security allowances that were supposed to have been received prior to Dashain, leaving old-aged persons, single mothers, and those with disabilities in a difficult situation. One of the people affected, 70-year-old Dikit Lama, of Bargaun of Simkot-3 said, “Despite frequenting the ward office, we have not been able to get our allowances due to the absence of office bearers. This has made it difficult to buy necessary medicines.”
A Chief Administrative Officer of the area, Arjun Darji admitted that the allowances have not yet been given adding, “It is all because of the ward chairperson’s delay in sending the records of the concerned allowance seekers and the absence of an accountant in the rural municipality.” Similarly, out of the 44 wards, including Namkha, Kharpunath, Sarkegad, Chakheli, Adanchuli and Takjakot, most of the wards of Simkot are sans secretaries.
Municipality Chairperson Dal Federa, of Adanchuli rural municipality, said that the difficulty they are facing in the distribution of social security allowances is due to the absence of staffers, with only one secretary covering six wards.
Despite six years having passed since the country embarked on a federal setup – federal, provincial and local levels – and close to two years since the people’s representatives were elected, local-level staff numbers are still inadequate. In Ram Prasad Rai rural municipality-7, Bhojpur, Silihangma Rai of Basikhora was given a birth registration certificate after 17 days of the initial application. The registration form was filled up and submitted by Silihangma’s father Samrat on the 10th of November at the ward office for her daughter who was born on the 7th of October. On the 26th of November, Assistant Sub-engineer at the rural municipality Gyan Raj Bhattarai prepared the certificate. In fact, it is not his job to process such registrations and he was there for an orientation session. Birth registrations are the duty of a ward secretary, however, Bhattarai stepped up in the absence of the secretary.
“My job is to look after the plan and technical sides. However, I am compelled to do all the work in the absence of the secretary” said Bhattarai, who ended up making five birth certificates, including Silihangma’s, and two death certificates on that day.
Depending on one secretary
Ram Prasad Rai rural municipality, which, by right, should have 19 employees, has been depending on a single employee to accomplish all tasks. The municipality currently has only four employees – Chief Administrative Officer, one sixth-grade officer, assistant sub-engineer, and sixth-grade Ayurvedic officer. The accountant and assistant accountant are both permanent employers of the federal government. Only one secretary is taking care of two wards – ward no 5 and 6 – among the eight wards of Ram Prasad Rai municipality.
The work at wards no 1,2,7 and 8 are nearly at a standstill after Tihar festival. Rural municipality chief administrative officer Jangam Rai says the work of registration has been entirely obstructed.
“Employees on contract basis have been filling the gap to accomplish works such as development plans. However, registration and certifying of birth, death, marriage, divorce, and migration have been badly affected owing to the absence of a ward secretary. Any urgent registration work has been done from the adjacent ward-6 office.
An engineer and two sub-engineers have been hired on a contract basis in the rural municipality for their dire need. Accomplishing a certain task from an employee on a contract basis sometimes becomes a Herculean task. Consider what Rai has to say: “Permanent staff is experienced and qualified, which contract-based employees lack. Hiring an employee on a contract basis will have a significant effect on the entire work.”
There has been a dearth of employees in several rural municipalities besides Saipal of Bajhang, Simkot of Humla and Ram Prasad Rai of Bhojpur districts. According to Hari Narayan Sharma, Organizational Development Branch Office of Federal Affairs and General Administration Ministry, among the 753 local levels across the country, there is a vacancy of a total of 20 thousand 94 employees at the local levels. Only 46 thousand 814 employees among the 66 thousand 908 vacancies have been adjusted at the local levels. A spokesperson at the Ministry, Bhupal Baral says around 21 thousand employees are still needed at the local levels as of now.
The Ministry says local levels at the mountainous and hilly regions still have an insufficient number of employees holding vital positions such as Chief Administration Officer, ward secretaries, and others. More than 30 local levels still do not have Chief Administration Officers. Acting Chief Administration Officers are currently managing these local levels while most of them lack secretaries. Sources claim that most of the local levels are without secretaries.
Relying on federal employees
The administration unit based in the Himali Rural Municipality of Bajura district is currently without a single local level employee. Instead, “adjusted” staff from the federal level are tasked with running and managing the rural municipality. The Local Government Operation Act 2074 states that the Chief Administrative Officer at the rural municipality has to be an eighth-level officer. However, the Acting Chief Administration officer at Himali Rural Municipality is fifth-level officer Janak Bahadur Shah, who was transferred from the Ministry of Information and Communications around eighteen months ago. Federal employees have also taken up the posts of an accountant and a clerk while fourth level assistant health workers and fifth-level ‘health assistants’ have come to the municipality under the adjustment scheme.
Every ward in the Himali Rural Municipality is without secretaries leaving the administration unit of the municipality responsible for the registration work. Under such circumstances, service-seekers of the municipality are required to go to the ward office for their work. According to Thapki Buda, 30, of Bachhya, Himali-5, it could take close to six hours to reach the office and another six to come back. If the ward office had had an employee, his commute would have been shortened to 45 minutes, saving significant energy and time.
Wards sans secretaries
Ward offices in Madhesh do not have a different story. The Ramnagar Rural Municipality of Sarlahi is running without a Chief Administration Officer for the last two-and-a-half years. Nayab Subba (Non-gazetted first-class officer) Dhairya Nath Singh has been taking up the role of Acting Chief Administration Officer. According to him, the municipality has one Nayab Subba, and two Kharidar-level (Non-Gazetted second class) technical assistants. All seven wards do not seem to have secretaries. Among the two Kharidar-level technical assistants, one looks after three wards and the other looks after four wards.
An engineer and sub-engineer hired under contract basis have been sorting out the issues on developmental works. However, Acting Chief Singh says they have not been able to accelerate the development works. “Out of the 30 projects that we had earlier committed to accomplishing in the first four months, we have been able to complete only 20 projects,” he said.
A total of 119 big and small-scale projects worth Rs 7 crore 95 lakhs are in the pipeline in the current fiscal year. Unfortunately, the field study of the project has not been done due to the absence of employees. “Lack of employees has adversely affected the development works despite our commitment,” he complains.
Ward chairman has a double responsibility
Dudhpokhari rural municipality of Lamjung has only three employees – a Chief Administrative Officer, a sixth-level officer, and a kharidar, who look after all the administrative works of the village municipality and the wards. All six wards of the municipality have been literally vacant without employees or office bearers. Consider what Dhruba Khanal, Chief Administrative Officer, has to say: “The irony is that I play the role of the office chief and the ward secretary.”
According to him, the three employees are under pressure to work day and night to provide service to the people as service seekers walk the whole day to reach the ward office.
Interestingly, the rural municipality chief Chhupi Maya Gurung, too, works as an employee to ensure that service seekers are not disappointed. “I work as a staff here. My repeated urges before the authorities, including the ministers and political leaders to deploy employees, went astray,” she lamented.
