NEPOTISM IN RECRUITMENT BY NAC

KEDAR DAHAL

KATHMANDU, July 20

National flag carrier Nepal Airlines Corporation (NAC) has again started to recruit staffers without competition under political pressure. Recruitment of lower level staffers under political pressure has been started now even though the NAC lacks skilled work force.

Twenty-one staffers have been recruited in ground support department, 11 in customer service department, 13 in operation department, five in finance department and three in commercial department without competition under pressure from the line ministry and political leadership, according to NAC sources. Similarly, direct recruitment of 12 staffers has been done in corporate, engineering, general service and property management departments. There are 11 departments in the NAC.

But Managing Director (MD) of NAC Sugat Ratna Kansakar denied direct recruitment of staffers. “A few have been recruited as it was absolutely necessary in the airport. It has not been done elsewhere. We are preparing to invite applications for free competition by publishing a notice in Gorkhapatra in a few days,” he claimed. Kansakar was brought back to the NAC immediately after Kripasur Sherpa became Tourism Minister. Sources claimed that Kansakar and NAC Chairman Shiva Sharan Neupane are currently recruiting cadres of different parties in the NAC. More than 55 have been recruited in different departments after Kansakar assumed office, the sources added.

There are 2,300 posts in the NAC but there are only 1,000 staffers now. It has been revealed that the management is moving forward the process of appointing more than 200 staffers in contract citing lack of staffers in the NAC. Kansakar is reportedly forced to do so following intense pressure from different political parties and chairman Neupane. The cabinet had dismissed Neupane but he has been reinstated following an interim order by the Supreme Court last week.

Staffers are being recruited in the administrative service on contract even as airplanes are being grounded in lack of technicians and pilots. NAC officials concede that it is wrong to recruit staffers in old style when the management should be improved by recruiting skilled staffers through free competition. Senior officials at the NAC, that is not in a state to repay the loan of Rs 10 billion taken from the Employees Provident Fund (EPF), are not happy with Kansakar’s action. “Kansakar was brought with hope that he will do well but staffers are getting recruited under pressure from the minister and different political parties. The NAC will teeter as in the past if recruitment of cadres of the minister and parties were to continue,” a senior NAC officer rued.

Kansakar, who has already served as general manager and then executive chairman of the NAC, had said he will focus on improving weak management of the NAC immediately after being re-appointed at the NAC. The sources said Kansakar has been facing intense pressure to recruit political cadres as he has come through political appointment.

There was problem in the NAC when the then general manager Madan Kharel had defied pressure from previous tourism ministers Bhim Acharya and Dipak Chandra Amatya to make political recruitment. Kharel had eventually resigned following intense pressure from minister. Over 100 staffers recruited when Acharya was minister have been fired under instruction of the Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA).