By Tina George, Minna
The Niger state government has been paying salaries and emoluments to 333 certified dead civil servants for the past two years, investigation has revealed.
The state Civil Service Screening Committee set up by the state government to verify the workers on its payroll, made the disclosure in Minna on Thursday.
Ashenewsdaily reported barely a week ago that a fake commissioner has been on the payroll of the state government and 80 civil servants were dismissed for fraudulent activities by the committee.
The Chairman of the Committee, Engineer Ibrahim Panti, who disclosed this in a radio interview, said that on a normal process, once a civil servant is certified dead, his salary is stopped, adding that it was a surprise that some syndicate were receiving the salaries of 333 dead civil servants.
He however said that investigation was ongoing to know who has been collecting the salaries.
Panti, who is the Commissioner for Works said that only 15,907 civil servants have been discovered to be genuine civil servants, adding some cases are still under investigation.
“Out of the purported 27,000 civil servants on the payroll of the state government, only 15,907 of them have been discovered to be our genuine workers so far.
“There are 3,923 workers from different Ministries still having pending issues and are still being investigated. These set of people had entered the state civil service with fictitious certificates and their names found on the payroll of the state.
“Within the last two years, 333 dead civil servants who had been certified dead are still drawing salaries from the state government and all these frauds must stop,” Panti said.
The Commissioner lamented that most of these who have been involved in siphoning government resources have been account officers and staff from the state Ministry of Health.
Speaking about those dismissed, the Commissioner said that they will be prosecuted because the revelations are too weighty to be swept under the carpet.
