40% of employees to leave Tehran by March 2011: official

TEHRAN, Nov. 23 (MNA)-- 40 percent of government employees will be transferred outside the capital city of Tehran by the end of the current Iranian calendar year (March 20, 2011), Vice President Lotfollah Forouzandeh announced.

So far 20,000 employees have voluntarily registered to be transferred to provincial offices of which 10,000 have left the capital, Forouzandeh told on Sunday.

Elsewhere in his remarks, Forouzandeh noted that according to law, in case an organization is relocated, its employees have five or six options so their transfer would not obligatory.

The vice president also said that those who have been transferred outside Tehran cannot apply to return since they have voluntarily chosen to leave and must stay in the designated province for 10 years.

Forouzandeh went on to say that state provincial offices are in need of workforce so the employees must be distributed in different provinces.

Following a directive ratified by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his ministers, the administration had set a deadline of August 22 for all executive administrative offices to relocate at least 40 percent of their personnel outside the capital.

However, according to reports, until that date only 1000 employees had left the capital while 200,000 employees should have been transferred by the set deadline.

The administration has also prohibited establishing any new organizations or posts in Tehran.