March 24, 2012
Sarita Giri was fired from her ministry post on Friday. The Prime Minister's decision came after Ms. Giri's defiance of directives to usher in reforms in foreign employment and taking tough action against manpower companies involved in duping migrant workers.
In a bid to curb malpractices and misinformation by the mushrooming manpower agencies, the Prime Minister's office had ordered the Labor and Transport Management Ministry to meet foreign companies' demands for manpower only after getting a clearance from Nepal's missions based in the home countries of these companies. Apparently, this was something Ms. Giri couldn’t bring herself to do.
Complaints lodged against her had been mounting recently after she had transferred D. G. Bhattarai on March 12. (D. G. Bhattarai was transferred to the department in November 2011 as part of the prime minister’s efforts to check corruption and better-manage the office.)
PM Bhattarai had directed officials to stop issuing licenses to new manpower agencies. Minister Giri was reportedly disappointed with DG Bhattarai mainly for not registering five new recruiting agencies. Bhattarai insisted that the agencies in question did not meet the required criteria.
Many questioned Sarita Giri’s credentials for being named minister in the first place. She is a member of the fringe Madhesi political party Nepal Sadbhavana Party (Anandidevi). In the 2008 national elections, she was gifted membership in the Constituent Assembly by proportional representation. Not exactly an extensive résumé.
In the event, when P.M Bhattarai asked her to resign on Wednesday, she fired back with a threat to withdraw her tiny party’s support of the government.
The Prime Minister was apparently unimpressed and appointed M.S. Thapa of the Rastriya Janamukti Party in Giri's place.
................................................................................................