Having faced a shortage of employees for long, the local governments are getting new employees after the Public Service Commission started recommending candidates for various local units.

As per the request of the federal government, the commission started the recruitment process in May by issuing vacancy notices for 9,161 employees for 515 local administrations.

Although the move faced strong protests for an alleged breach of the jurisdiction of the provincial governments and the failure to ensure adequate reservations for various marginalised groups, the process moved ahead after the Supreme Court didn’t bar the recruitment process.

When the issue reached the top court, it gave a go-ahead to the recruitment plans on July 1.

“We have been recommending candidates for three weeks now for the local level,” said Ananda Raj Dhakal, secretary at the commission. “In the first phase, we are recommending section officer level staff.”

According to Dhakal, the commission would recommend candidates for the post of senior non-gazetted officers and fourth level staff in the next phase. The commission’s offices in Ilam, Dhankuta, Kathmandu and Jaleshwor have already recommended names. According to the commission, it has recommended around 180 section officer level staff for recruitment at various local governments.

“The recommendation process will continue and we hope to conclude the process of hiring all 9,161 officials by December-end,” said Dhakal.

Local governments, particularly the rural municipalities, are facing an acute shortage of staff. According to the National Association of Rural Municipalities in Nepal, more than 1,800 wards of the 3,201 rural municipalities in the country are without secretaries at present.

There is also an acute shortage of other staff, particularly on the technical side, at the offices of both the rural municipalities and their wards, making service delivery difficult, officer-bearers of the association said. Most of the rural municipalities have recruited staff on a contract basis, to run their offices.

After the commision started recommending the candidates, the local governments facing staff crunch expect their service delivery to improve with some of the vacant posts filled.

For example, the commission recently recommended two officer level staff—one for accounts and the other for administration, for Likhu Rural Municipality of Nuwakot.

“Recruitments from the commission will not be enough for us because we still have several posts vacant,” said Rojina Rai, vice-chairperson of the rural municipality.

This local government recently demanded 16 candidates from the Public Service Commission of Province 3. “We have more than 300 infrastructure projects but have just one sub-engineer and another technical worker under the sub-engineer,” she said.

According to Rai, as matters stand, they are facing an acute shortage of personnel in the agricultural sector. Besides, staff in the administration department is also inadequate, she added.