How Epic ‘Ghost Workers’ Fraud Is Costing Nigeria Billions — Daily Trust Investigation

With the deep entrenchment in the very fabric of the civil service - on federal and state levels - of payroll fraud, does Nigeria stand a ghost of a chance? 

Daily Trust report continues:

For decades, payroll fraud has continued to drain incredible sums of money from the Nigerian civil service. Infamously known as ‘ghost workers’, various methods have been employed to check the syndrome, but those behind it continue to find new techniques. At all levels of government - federal and state - there is a renewed fervour to tackle the problem, especially since the coming of the President Muhammadu Buhari administration, the quest for transparency and the economic downturn.

The term ‘ghost worker’ was born in reference to employees who convert salaries through false means, or where a fictitious person or a real worker simply did not work but got paid. This, of course, is perpetrated almost exclusively by civil servants within the civil service.

The implementation of Biometric Verification Number (BVN), the Treasury Single Account (TSA) and the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) are, among others, steps to check ‘ghost workers’.

Various federal government agencies have recently rolled out related hair-raising figures, of ‘ghost workers’ identified or removed from payrolls of organizations. Last month, the Director-General, Bureau of Public Service Reforms, Dr. Joe Abah said the federal government saved over ₦185billion by removing 65,000 ghost workers since the implementation of IPPIS. He added that its Work Efficiently Unit had identified 23,000 people that were collecting multiple salaries.

Also, the acting Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, (EFCC), Mr. Ibrahim Magu reportedly said the commission detected 37,395 ghost workers on the payroll of the federal civil service. He also revealed that the federal government lost about ₦1billion to ghost workers within a certain period.

Then came the shocking revelation in March this year, by Minister of Finance, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, that the federal government was investigating an additional 11,000 ‘ghost workers’ it discovered on its payroll. She said that the recent removal of 23,000 from the federal civil service had reduced government’s monthly payroll by ₦2.29 billion.
Irked by the scandal of phenomenal proportions, the Secretary-General, Association of Senior Civil Servants of Nigeria (ASCSN), Comrade Alade Bashir Lawal, demanded that the federal government set-up a joint government-labour panel to establish the authenticity of the claim of the 23,000 ghost workers in its fold.

Over 43,000 ‘ghost workers’ are believed to appear on various payrolls, with a top government official revealing to Daily Trust that “The public service, including the judiciary, police, military, NNPC, CBN and para-military, are hotbeds of the so-called ghost worker scams.” He added that unbelievable levels of scandal will be discovered if a comprehensive biometric staff audit of the public service is carried out.

It was also gathered that without the involvement and cooperation of workers, government efforts can yield only so much results, falling short of the desired level of eradication.
Cartels of sorts, according to a source, are responsible for the stealthily stolen money, creating aliases to which salaries slim and fat are paid. The ‘owners’ of these fabricated workers would then, sometimes in collaboration with bank officials, cash out. “You will be shocked at the number of senior and juniour civil servants who ‘own’ such workers,” she said.

Another source, a civil servant who claimed to have put 12 years in as a federal worker said the top echelon is to blame, as it is through their instructions to subordinates that the ‘ghost worker’ syndrome flourishes. Yet another said some of the ‘ghost workers’ were actually ghosts, as many who have died and whose files have not been updated, are co-opted in the scam.

When asked if the relatives of those involved did not come for claims as next-of-kin, he replied that the tiresome nature of doing that and the bureaucratic processes involved made some of the relatives lose interest, while many others do not even come at all.

A highly-placed source in the federal civil service told Daily Trust that the recent revelations by the present administration are just a tip of the iceberg, as cartels of sorts run the illicit industry. He said some of the stories bandied around sound like fantasies but are, indeed, true. He mentioned that all kinds of names are slotted into payment vouchers to draw salaries, including names of year-old children, domestic staff and even pets.

The Head of the Civil Service of the Federation (HCSF), Mrs. Winifred Ekanem Oyo-Ita, was not available for comment, as a request letter submitted to her office still has not been responded to.

Across the states, discoveries on how payment vouchers are manipulated to slot fake names to withdraw huge sums continue. In Ebonyi State, the Commissioner for Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, Mr. Samuel Okoronkwo, said it discovered 838 ‘ghost workers’ as, ironically, cemetery-keepers drawing salaries from the consolidated Health Salary Scheme.

Then in Bayelsa State, about N24bn is lost yearly to payroll fraud, while in Plateau State, an interim report of a verification exercise revealed 1,832 ‘ghost teachers’ were traced to a single individual.

Plateau governor Simon Lalong also revealed that his administration inherited a monthly wage bill of ₦1.7 billion, which has remained consistent, long after records have shown that many workers have either retired or passed on, explaining that payroll fraudsters are responsible for the development.

In Kaduna State, 2,087 ‘ghost workers’ were discovered in 20 of the 23 local government areas through a staff audit by a committee set-up by Governor Nasir El-Rufai. The bulk of the phony names were from the Local Government Education Authority and traditional councils.

In Benue State, the Special Adviser on Bureau for Local Government and Chieftaincy Affairs, (BLGCA), Mr. Titus Zam said they discovered about 4,000 ghost workers in a verification exercise of all 23 councils, and that the actual staff on its payroll currently stand at 24,900 against the 29,000 it inherited from the previous administration.

Additionally, state governor Dr. Samuel Ortom said the state saved ₦2.8billion of the bailout funds, which could have been siphoned by so-called ‘ghost workers’. He explained that due to massive corruption going on at the local council level, his administration decided to conduct a screening exercise, which edged out non-existent workers.
In Kano State, a total of 7,629 ‘ghost workers’ were discovered on government’s payroll recently. The State Head of Service, Malam Muhammad Auwal Na’iya, who disclosed this said following the discovery, the state government would begin to save about ₦283million monthly. He said the discovery followed the introduction of the biometric capture exercise by the Abdullahi Ganduje-led administration.

It can be recalled that last year, the Kebbi State Government during its preliminary investigation into the state civil service system uncovered about 25,000 primary school teachers who do not exist, in essence ‘ghost teachers’, as well as 10,000 in secondary schools. The spokesperson of the committee set-up by the state government to check the trend, Alhaji Sani Dododo, said the committee also discovered over 200 ‘ghost schools’, which were not only nonexistent, but with phantom staff included in government payroll.

The Chief of Staff to the governor, Alhaji Suleiman Argungu, told Daily Trust that the previous government in the state had over 636 bank accounts which only the former head of the agencies knew about, and they were used to siphon money.

In Oyo, the state government announced the suspension of salaries of 16,532 workers, as a result of alleged fraud, including falsification of retirement age, drawing multiple salaries and using multiple bank accounts to conceal financial illegalities, among others. A 5-man staff verification panel set up by the government to further evaluate the case of each of the affected workers on a one-on-one basis is currently in the process of winding up and expected to soon make public its findings.

The Secretary to the State Government, Alhaji Ishmail Olalekan Ali, told newsmen recently in Ibadan that a total of 569 workers were incriminated in drawing multiple salaries from multiple accounts just as 1,277 employees who had passed retirement age were still collecting salaries.

Although the verification of workers in Bauchi State has not been concluded, some discoveries are already in the kitty. The Press Secretary to the governor, Abubakar El-Sadique, in a text message to Daily Trust confirmed that the verification was done after a sample exercise was carried out in some local government areas. It read: “Verification of over 91,000 workers on the state payroll started after January salary because of dwindling resources.

We discovered 86 teachers with fake certificates after sampling four local governments and many others were recruited without being paid for about seven months and felt more could be found if all local governments were audited. With this, the figure of workers rose to 105,690. We therefore can’t give the number of ghost workers so far found because another six committees haven’t submitted their reports.”
It could be recalled that the state Accountant-General had at the beginning of the exercise said in a statement that about 19,000 “ghost workers” have been discovered which will save the state over a billion naira. Subsequent discoveries made by the government led to the sack of some top civil servants including some directors and permanent secretaries in some agencies.

In Kogi State, Governor Yahaya Bello, in his quest to rid the state of payroll fraud, set up a 28-member staff verification committee in February 2016. Although the committee is yet to submit its final report, revelations from the screening exercise across the state were mindboggling, as monumental fraud, running into billions of naira, have been reportedly uncovered.

Governor Bello, who spoke recently on the exercise, disclosed that the staff audit has led to discovery of shady deals, noting that discovery was made of a civil servant who has been singlehandedly pocketing salaries of over 300 ‘ghost workers’ every month.

Also speaking recently on the exercise, the former chairman of the screening committee, retired General Paul Okuntimo said the committee uncovered over 3,000 bank accounts operated by individuals or cartels.

The staff verification committee set up by the Adamawa State Government has identified over 12,000 ‘ghost workers’ in the 21 local government areas of the state. The chairman of the committee, Maurice Vunobolki, gave the figure while presenting the committee’s report to Governor Muhammadu Jibrilla in Yola. They also discovered 1,780 under-aged persons on the payroll, while 563 workers were identified as overdue for retirement. Government lost over ₦300million monthly across the local government areas.

Also, the verification in Kwara State is still going on, to determine the actual number of ‘ghost workers’ there. The state government had continuously insisted on provision of BVN before any worker is paid. Governor Abdulfattah Ahmed, who is also the Chairman of the Committee on Personnel Database Development recently said the committee had discovered many workers with multiple account numbers and fake BVNs. The Senior Special Assistant to the Governor on Media, Dr. Muideen Akorede, said the committee’s work is not finished, so definite figures cannot be given yet.

Also worried by the growing trend, Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike, said only civil servants who have completed their biometric screening and are captured would henceforth receive their salaries. He said this on the heels of the recent discovery that more than 1,000 civil servants were receiving salaries in different ministries from the ones they actually served. He said it was shocking that over 50,000 civil servants take a large chunk of state revenue, with only 4,000 turning up for biometrics.

In Cross River State, the final document on workers verification is currently being worked on and will be released in a few weeks. But the state’s Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB) has concluded an exercise where 33 teachers were found to be illegally engaged. Executive Chairman of the board, Dr. Steve Odey, said they aimed to weed out so-called ‘ghost teachers’.

In Niger State, about 4,000 nonexistent civil servants have been discovered in various local governments, ministries and government agencies, Daily Trust gathered. They are staff that cannot be found on the 2016 list, but their names continued to appear in monthly payment vouchers. Also, 22 nonexistent primary schools were also discovered in Chanchaga local government area of the state, including phantom teachers, in the ongoing biometric verification exercise.

In Ekiti State, Governor Ayodele Fayose recently said that while the state has discovered 307 ‘ghost workers’, the number could rise. However, unofficially, it was gathered that ₦500million was saved from the exercise in the state.

In Katsina State, about N9million is believed to be lost monthly to ‘ghost workers’, according to state governor, Alhaji Aminu Masari. Civil service insiders, however, insist that the actual figure could be significantly higher. An initial committee uncovered about 797 nonexistent workers in the state civil service and the 34 local government areas. The governor accused top government officials and traditional institutions of conniving with some civil servants.

Also, in Nasarawa State, a total of over 1,600 were discovered in the final report submitted of the BVN exercise conducted by the state government in collaboration with Skye Bank, whose Executive Director North, Idris Yakubu, made known to newsmen shortly after presenting the final report of the exercise to Governor Umaru Tanko Al-Makura. He said the report, if properly implemented, would enable the government save ₦83million monthly and about ₦990million annually.

In Edo, the state government said they have long rid the state of ‘ghost workers’, according to the Commissioner of Information, Kaseem Afegbua. “We have taken biometric data of all the civil servants in the state and it is now e-governance we are doing in Edo State and as such we don’t have issue of ghost workers,” he said.

But with the almost-daily release of mind-boggling numbers across the nation, it seems the problem of ‘ghost workers’ will continue to haunt the Nigerian civil service.