LALITPUR: The agitating employees of the local bodies have decided to halt the garbage collection in the Kathmandu Valley beginning tomorrow.

Demanding that the government promote temporary staffs to permanent status and grant career development and trade union rights, the employees have since five days shut down all the offices of the local bodies.

Today's decision follows the continuous silence of the government over their demand.

Agitating employees have halted all the services provided by the local bodies, including the distribution of citizenship cards and passports. They have also decided to stage a sit-in in front of the Singh Durbar on December 24 followed by an indefinite sit-in in front of the Ministry of Local Development beginning December 27.

Dinesh Kumar Thapaliya, spokesperson at the Ministry of Local Development, said that since the government was preoccupied in the three-day national strike called by the Unified CPN -Maoists, it had little time to spare for the union's demand.However, he said that a meeting would be convened tomorrow to sort out the problems. "We need another three days for that," he added.

According to the agitating local body employees' union, they would immediately withdraw the strike should the government approve the fourth amendment of the Local Self Governance Regulation, pending before the cabinet since three months. The local body staff had earlier postponed their strike till December due to the Maoist stir, said Dr Sumitra Amatya, general manager at the Solid Waste Management and Resource Mobilisation Centre under the MoLD.

"But now they are bent on continuing their strike, including the halting of garbage collection and disposal," she added.