Kathmandu, August 2
Secretary at the Ministry of General Administration, Mohan Krishna Sapkota, has warned that the government might force staff to take retirement if they do not agree to take new responsibilities at local and provincial levels.
Sapkota’s warning comes after the official trade union of government staff put forth a number of conditions including one-rank blanket promotion and other facilities to deploy staff from the central to newly structured provincial and local units.
In an interview with Onlinekhabar, Sapkota says, “Staff should go anywhere the state sends on the basis of its necessity. Otherwise, we have to take retirement.”
“What I have understood is staff should report to the workstations assigned by the government. Who else would go if not us?”
“It seems we have thought that we are people at the centre and therefore should not go to other districts,” he says, “But, it is not true. We are people of government and we need to obey the government.”
Meanwhile, he warns that the government will act stricter if the trade union and staff continue to disobey the government.
In another context, Sapkota says blanket promotion is not possible as demanded by the trade union. Rather, staff deployed to local and provincial units can be provided with other additional benefits, he suggested.
“Promotion can be given on the basis of merits, but not haphazardly. But, promotion is not the solution,” he says, “They might have been worried that they could be deprived to the right to get promoted upto the status of chief secretary as today. If we can retain that right in them, the proposed adjustment will be correct.”
He, however, adds that a bill related to the adjustment is currently under discussion in Parliament and the House is free to keep any provision in its wish.
Clarifying that the current deployment is just for an interim period till the new law on adjustment of staff will come into effect, he appeals to all the staff to report to the assigned places for now.
“We are managing staff through executive orders as the local units already got people’s elected representatives, but not staff. It is an interim management,” he assures, “We will address their demands while managing long-term adjustments.”
