• Ministry of Education: 9,463
• Ministry of Works: 5,167
• Ministry of Information: 3,715
• Ministry of Foreign Affairs: 2,934
• N118.9bn lost through salaries, allowances
• Call for prosecution of accounting officers responsible heightens
Office of the Accountant- General of the Federation has discovered 46,639 ghost workers in the federal civil service. The figure represents 25 per cent of the entire workforce. Surprisingly, 255 of these were discovered in the Accountant-General’s office. In the Ministry of Finance supervised by the Finance Minister and Coordinating Minister for the Economy, Dr. Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, 1,367 ghost workers were discovered.
In the Ministry of Education, 9,463 ghost workers were fished out, Works, 5,167; Foreign Affairs, 2,934; and Information, 3,715; among others. It took the Accountant General’s office years to discover the ugly phenomenon and details were recorded in a statistical report obtained by New Telegraph. In all, ghost workers were discovered in 103 Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs). One of the top officials in the Accountant-General’s Office said the agencies were “subjected to an integrity test to track down ghost workers and plug revenue leakages in the system”.
The revelation came just as the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) renewed its campaign for the recovery of the N118.9 billion said to have been lost to the ghost workers through salaries and allowances. It also called for the prosecution of all accounting and administrative officers responsible for the phenomenon in the public service. In the statistical report, details of the spread of the 46,639 ghost workers in all the ministries and agencies were released.
Highlights of the report showed that the National Planning Commission had the lion share of 74.90 per cent of its workforce as ghost workers; Federal Ministry of Finance had 68.35 per cent; Budget Office of the Federation,77.33 per cent; Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation,74.68 per cent and Ministry of Niger Delta 64.87 per cent. Others are Public Service Institute, 66.67 per cent, Federal Ministry of Information, 57.15 per cent and the Federal Ministry of Works, 51.67 per cent. It will be recalled that Dr Okonjo- Iweala, last year, announced that the Federal Government discovered and weeded out 46,639 ghost workers through the implementation of the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS).
The exercise, according to Okonjo-Iweala, was conducted across 215 Ministries, Departments and Agencies of Government (MDAs) and saved the government a whooping N118.9 billion. A closer look at the document showed that the National Planning Commission, which had a total of 1,000 staff on its nominal roll before the exercise, came down to 251, an indication that it had as many as 749 ghost workers.
The Federal Ministry of Finance had 2,000 workers on its payroll but the exercise uncovered a total of 1,367 ghost workers leaving behind 633 genuine work force. Similarly, the Budget Office had 1,500 workers on its pay roll but was left with only 340 workers after 1,160 of them were weeded out in the intensive screening exercise. However, 321 MDAs are still outstanding and have not been incorporated into the IPPIS to ascertain the extent of their infiltration by ghost workers.
A civil society coalition, Stop Impunity Nigeria Campaign (SIN), through the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) had last year filed a Freedom of Information (FoI) request to the Minister of Finance, asking for the details of the Accounting Officers (as defined in the Financial Regulations) and other public officers who presided over the N118.9 billion loss to the treasury. However, this request was not honoured by the Ministry of Finance.
Upon the Minister’s refusal to grant the request, SIN, in Suit No. FHC/ABJ/ CS/261/2013 (Centre for Social Justice Ltd by Guarantee Vs The Minister of Finance & Anor) approached the Federal High Court, Abuja to compel compliance with the Freedom of Information Act. The civil society wanted the court to compel government to reveal to Nigerians, the names of the MDAs that harboured the ghost workers as well as the Accounting Officers who presided over the recruitment and payment of salaries to these workers. In a bid to resolve the controversy, the Ministry of Finance mandated the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation to respond to the FoI request.
Lead Director, Centre for Social Justice, Mr Eze Onyekpere, who received the report on behalf of his coalition, expressed delight that the Stop Impunity Campaign had achieved a partial success on the matter. Onyekpere, a lawyer, argued that the Accounting Officers (being the Permanent Secretary of a Ministry or the head of an Extra-Ministerial Department) of the MDAs as at the time these ghost workers drew the salaries and perks of office were, according to the Financial Regulations, in full control and should be held responsible for the loss incurred by the government.
“They were responsible for safeguarding public funds and the regularity and propriety of expenditure under their control. The N118.9 billion did not disappear into thin air. Some FGN officials inserted the ghosts into the payroll, the approving authorities approved of same, whilst others collected and shared the money over time.
The culprits are identifiable, traceable and the long arms of the law can still reach them,” Onyekpere said. He urged the government to extend its hunt for ghost workers to all MDAs and expressed dismay that no steps have been taken since 2013 to recover the N118.9 billion. He said that Federal Government’s refusal to take steps for the recovery of the money was “an endorsement of corruption, a manifestation of impunity and an encouragement to intending treasury looters to seek to perfect their crime.” Before the search began, there were 180,789 workers. After the 46,639 (25.8%) ghost workers were weeded out, the federal civil service is now left with 134,150 workers.
Source: New Telegraph
