Fred Itua, Abuja
The Senate has said it would investigate and expose top civil servants, permanent secretaries and syndicates engaged in job racketeering in Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs).
Chairman, Senate Committee on Ethics, Privileges and Public Petitions, Ayo Akinyelure, at a press briefing said the job scam had gone on for too long unchecked in the MDAs and that the trend had led to financial fraud by those directly and indirectly involved.
He said some applicants who fell victims of the fraud, who petitioned the Senate, claimed they paid between N500,000 to N1.5 million per slot as bribe to gain employment.
He said candidates who were unable to pay the bribe, were sometimes delayed for over two years without any documentation, whereas, monies meant for payment of their salaries, were unaccounted for by accounting officers of MDAs.
Akinyelure said they were in possession of bank accounts of top civil servants in MDAs, who received payments from job applicants. He said faces behind the receipt of the job racketeering would be revealed.
Listing the ministries, the document obtained by Daily Sun revealed “Ministry of Health, Water Resources and Rural Development, Agriculture and Rural Development and Defence as among listed MDAs involved in the job racketeering.”
One of the documents read: “This document beams searchlight into all MDAs of the Federal Government through the Senate Committee on Ethics, Privileges and Public Petitions as the voice of the voiceless Nigerians in the upper chamber of the National Assembly. The Permanent Secretary and Director of Human Resources and Administration of various Ministries, Departments and Agencies of the Federal Government deliberately failed to document qualified Nigerian graduates employees deployed to their ministries by the Federal Civil Service Commission for their yearly declared vacancies for which billions of naira appropriation of funds.
“Personnel cost budget has been approved by the National Assembly yearly under (2016 2019) Appropriation Act of the Federation. It has been the practice of the Permanent Secretary in connivance with the Director of Human Resources of various ministries to deliberately fail to document the engaged staff deployed to them by the Federal Civil Service Commission on their declared vacancies annually.
“Some syndicates are acting for some key officers of the MDAs demand between N500,000 to N1,500,000 before candidates engaged by Federal Civil Service Commission and deployed to the ministries have to pay before proper documentation can be completed for them to start work. Candidates who cannot afford the cash gratifications are left undocumented for years while the appropriated fund to pay their salaries are misappropriated yearly unchecked.
“We have evidence of letter of employment of some candidates engaged since 2018 by the Federal Civil Service Commission and deployed to some Ministries but yet to be documented up till now thereby painting the present administration of President Muhammadu Buhari black in the face of Nigerians who massively voted him to power as the Head of highly corrupt.”