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Urgent Need For More Elaborate Audit Of Government
Payrolls / Prosecution And Punishment Of Perpetrators Of Ghost
Workers’ Fraud
Newsdiaryonline Wed Aug 1,2011
The Trade Union Congress of Nigeria (TUC) Rivers State commends
the various State Governments and Federal agencies that have
discovered ghost workers in their payroll in recent times. We
note that Ghost workers are a huge fraud that robs the states
and federal governments of several billions of naira monthly.
For instance , the Rivers State Universal Basic Education Board
recently announced that it saved the state N200 million monthly
with the removal of 1,477 ghost workers discovered on the
board’s payroll. Also Dr Olusegun Aganga now Minister of Trade &
Investment, recently disclosed that about 43,000 ghost workers
were on the payroll of Ministries, Department and Agencies,
MDAs, of the Federal Government drawing salaries worth over N12
billion annually. Similarly the Inspector General of Police,
Hafiz Ringim, last December announced that the Police had
recovered N6billion just after two months of an auditing
exercise which showed that there were some 107,000 Ghost
policemen in the police payroll.
In another development some 4,000
ghost workers were found, out of the 10,300 names in the payroll
of the National Identity Management Commission following
the conclusion of a biometric data capture exercise. Even the
local government is not spared of the menace of ghost workers as
the five-man committee headed by Mr. Dibiya Ayakurai, set up to
audit the staff of Sagbama Local Government Area of Bayelsa
State, uncovered a N10 million monthly wage scam and these
included some 29 dead persons and 72 ghost workers who has been
receiving salaries since 2003. Also surveys of health management
boards across the country suggest that there is huge incidence
of ghost workers in the sector.
The ghost worker syndrome has been a terrible menace across all
tiers of government over the years leading to huge leakages
running into several billions of naira monthly from the public
coffers through salary payments to non-existing employees, who
have fraudulently been listed on the payroll system. Some of
these employees may include retired public servants, deceased
people or pure fictitious names. Only recently it was reported
that the Registrar and Chief Executive Officer, Institute of
Supervision and Leadership, Dr. Funsho Akinya, has said that
about 40 per cent of salaries and wages paid by both the private
and public sectors in Nigeria are lost to ghost workers
annually. This is very huge and government at all levels must
carry out special audit and investigations to identify ghost
workers and bring their perpetrators to book.
One thing that is clear is that these salaries are collected by
living persons and it is important that all such persons
including those who aid them are identified and prosecuted.
Consequently we urge the Federal and State Governments to go
beyond the identification of ghost workers on the government
payroll to punishment of those responsible. It is important to
ask how names of those ghost workers got on the payroll in the
first place, who has been receiving the salaries and more
importantly ensure that all those involved in the ghost workers
fraud are identified and prosecuted immediately to serve as an
effective deterrent. We also call on the Economic and Financial
Crimes Commission to investigate the reported cases of ghost
workers with a view to ensuring that all those responsible or
involved in the scam are identified and prosecuted. The fight
against corruption cannot be seen to have made any progress if
nothing is done to by EFCC, ICPC and other relevant agencies to
investigate and prosecute all those involved in defrauding the
country at least in the reported cases of ghost workers.
Solidarity forever
For: Trade Union Congress of Nigeria (TUC)
Rivers State Council
Comrade Hyginus Chika Onuegbu JP, FCA
State Chairman
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