To adjust the temporary civil servants in the  new federal set-up, the government is planning to either delegate them to different offices under the three layers of the government or lay them off with severance packages.

According to the estimates of the Ministry of Federal Affairs and General Administration (MoFAGA), there are around 10,000 temporary civil servants working for various government agencies, most of them as drivers and office assistants.

After the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) sought suggestion from the MoFAGA on adjusting the temporary civil servants, the latter has come up with four recommendations: asking various ministries to determine how many temporary employees they needed from the current cohort of such staffers and adjust them accordingly; requesting the local and the provincial governments to adjust the temporary staffers  employed at regional and zonal offices which have now come under lower governments; adjusting them in different programmes and projects considering their experiences; and giving graceful exit to the redundant temporary staff by offering them incentives.

MoFAGA Spokesperson Suresh Adhikari said the ministry will soon submit its recommendations to the PMO.

“While adjusting the temporary staff under the federal set-up, the ministry will make the effort to offer them permanent status as well,” he said.

The ministry had formed an informal task force, led by Joint Secretary Bhupal Baral, to address this issue of temporary civil servants.

 After the country entered the federal set-up, the government adopted the policy of removing temporary civil servants, considering that temporary employees might not be necessary at the centre, with most of the offices due to fall under the scope of provincial and local governments.

The government had asked the temporary civil servants not to register their attendance from July 17. The move had however prompted a protest from the temporary civil servants and led the PMO to instruct the concerned ministries to adjust them for at least three more months. 

The government has not allocated the budget to pay the temporary civil servants though.

Adhikari said that offices which do not have enough permanent employees could adjust the salary for their temporary staff from the current budget allocation.

The trade unions of civil servants said that they wanted permanent solution to the issue.

Punya Prasad Dhakal, chairman of Trade Union of Civil Servants, said the government should determine the number of seats in civil service and adjust the temporary staffers within the vacant seats based on merits before offering incentives to redundant workers.