FG saved N200bn from 50,000 ghost workers in 2016 – Presidential aide says

chika ebuzor

December 27, 2016 7:00 PM

Shehu made this known at an interactive meeting with State House correspondents in Abuja on Tuesday.

The Federal government says it has got rid of 50,000 ghost workers from its payroll and subsequently saving the country a huge amount of N200 billion.

Malam Garba Shehu, the Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity to the President, made this known at an interactive meeting with State House correspondents in Abuja on Tuesday.

According to him, about N13billion has been taken off the payroll monthly from February to December this year.

“The flagship programme of the Muhammadu Buhari administration to rid the system of fraud and instill good governance is on course.

“Through a notable initiative, the Efficiency Unit of the Federal Ministry of Finance, the government has embarked on the continuous auditing of the salaries and wages of government departments.

“When the committee was constituted in February 2016, Federal government monthly salary bill was N151 billion excluding pensions.

“Now the monthly salary warrant is N138 billion, excluding pensions. Which means that the government is making a monthly saving of about N13 billion. That is from February 2016 to date,” he said.

The Presidential spokesman explained that the “the pension bill was 15.5bn monthly as at February.

He said “Now, it is down to N14.4 billion, which means average monthly saving is made of about N1.1 billion.”

Shehu announced that 11 persons championing the syndicate of ghost workers had been handed over to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) for further interrogation and possible prosecution.

chika ebuzor