The administration of Benue State, led by Governor Hyacinth Alia, made a significant discovery on the state’s payroll, revealing the existence of 2,500 ghost employees, News About Nigeria reports.
Governor Alia expressed his regret over the delay in paying the salaries of teachers in elementary and secondary schools, as well as local government personnel. This statement was conveyed by his chief press secretary, Sir Tersoo Kula.
The Governor explained that the decision to postpone salary payments was made after the government noticed “mindless padding of the wage bill and other fraudulent manipulations on their payroll”.
This outrage discovery necessitated a thorough cleanup and verification process to determine the accurate wage bill and identify genuine employees that truly deserve their salaries.
The governor affirmed that a comprehensive staff verification and payroll audit was recently concluded for all teachers and local government employees of the state, and this led to the discovery and removal of over 2500 ghost workers from the payroll.
He said, “Just been concluded, and it has already uncovered over 2500 ghost workers that have already been removed from the payroll.”
According to Governor Alia, the audit revealed more discrepancies and several payroll violations were exposed, including ghost workers, ghost schools, double dipping, unlawful employment, salary padding, payment to deceased or retired individuals, unlawful replacement, and inflation of the wage bill.
He emphasized that apart from eliminating ghost workers, the government was also implementing measures to safeguard the system database against future abuses.
He reassured that legitimate employees who passed the screening would receive their salaries before the end of the current week.
