Lamjung, January 6

With around one-thirds of the wards in Lamjung operating without secretaries, service delivery at the local bodies has been affected.

The district comprising eight local bodies including four municipalities has a total of 75 wards. Of them, 24 wards don’t have secretaries.

The ward secretaries were transferred elsewhere as part of the staff adjustment process, but their replacements are yet to arrive, the posts have been lying vacant for the past three months or so.

According to Dudh Pokhari Rural Municipality chairperson Chhupimaya Gurung, 3 of the 6 wards of the municipality are operating without a secretary now.

“Service delivery has been affected a lot due to lack of secretaries,” said Gurung, adding that while in some cases a secretary had to look after more than one ward, elsewhere some other employee has been acting as a stand-in.

In Madhya Nepal Municipality, 5 out of 10 wards lack ward secretaries now. “We’re making do with one ward secretary taking charge of an additional ward now,” said Mayor Ramesh Kumar Pande.

Likewise, the post of ward secretaries are also vacant in the four wards of Sundar Bazaar and Rainas Municipality and Dordi Rural Municipality. These three local bodies have 11, 10 and 9 wards respectively.

Out of 9 wards, Marsyangdi and Kholasothar rural municipalities have 3 and 1 post of ward secretary lying vacant now.