A current audit in Anambra State has uncovered a disturbing development within the native authorities’s payroll system – 427 ghost employees are nonetheless on the books, drawing salaries regardless of now not being lively staff. The group contains retirees, deceased individuals, and employees who now reside overseas.
Vin Ezeaka, the chairman of the Native Authorities Civil Service Fee, revealed these findings at a press convention in Awka.
“We found 59 deceased workers who’re nonetheless receiving salaries, 40 retirees additionally receiving salaries, and above all, we found 222 employees on the payroll who no person might determine as employees in any of the 21 Council areas,” Ezeaka mentioned.
“And we’ve got a lot of them dwelling overseas and nonetheless receiving salaries, so we wrote to the Joint Account, JAC to take away them from the payroll, he added.
Ezeaka detailed the extent of the problem, which spans throughout all 21 native authorities areas in Anambra, reflecting a deep-seated systemic drawback.
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The investigation additionally prolonged to certificates fraud inside the native authorities. A particular committee was tasked to confirm the credentials of staff and located a number of instances of fraudulent diplomas, with six confirmed instances involving faux certificates from Imo State College.
He additional mentioned:
“A few of them (the retirees) have come to voluntarily retire however we refused as a result of you’ll be able to’t cheat authorities and need to retire.
“We’re going to end our thorough investigation and people caught on this unholy act will face the complete weight of the regulation in accordance with civil service guidelines.
“Aside from this discovery, on the finish of Could 2024, one thing dramatic occurred, we descended on the Certificates racketeering cartel inside the native authorities system.
“These indicted have been recognized and we began investigating the certificates they offered to the committee and went so far as going to the schools whose certificates they brandished and out of the 20 individuals who tendered Imo State College certificates, we screened 14 to date the place we found that six out of the 14 have been faux certificates.
“So we’ve got handled that side additionally. It’s our obligation to sanitise the system in keeping with the mandate given to us by Governor Chukwuma Soludo in order that the real employees who sacrifice their time and vitality can get worth for his or her service and never looters who don’t contribute something to the event of Anambra state.”
Ezeaka assured that the investigations have been complete and never meant as a witch-hunt, however as a obligatory step to cleanse the system and cease the monetary drain brought on by these discrepancies.