From Desmond Mgboh, Kano
Kano State Government has discovered 7,629 “ghost workers” on its payroll, the state Head of Service, Alhaji Muhammad Awwal Naiya has announced.
Speaking at a press conference in his office, yesterday, he said the “ghost workers” were discovered following a Biometric Data Capture exercise which was conducted by a team of consultants hired by the state government.
The HoS, who described the exercise as on-going, said of 86,373 forms submitted to the consultants handling the exercise, only 71,479 workers were captured while 7,629 purported to be workers had so far not appeared to be captured.
He disclosed that the workers, who did not show up for the exercise, despite being placed on several notices, were presumed to be non-existing until a contrary evidence emerged, adding that their names had, therefore been deleted from the state’s payroll with effect from this month.
With the removal of a total of 7,629 names from the state’s payroll, Naiya said the state government would be saving an estimated figure of N284 million on a monthly basis, adding that the saved money will be reallocated to other needs of the government.
Naiya also announced the discovery of 17 staff who were identified as collecting salaries from both the state Hospital Management Board and the Primary HealthCare Management Board respectively, resulting in an estimated monthly saving of N1,010,053.15.
He said the salaries of the affected staff had been removed from the payroll, adding that they were following due process to ensure that the staff returned the excess payments that they had collected, after which they would be prosecuted.
He said that the state government was committed to reinvigorate the State Public Service to bring it in tandem with global best practices adding that the Data Capturing exercise initiated was one of the efforts undertaken to realize this goal.