The Chairman of the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), Dr. Musa Aliyu, said on Wednesday the commission recovered over N20 billion in pension deductions from the salaries of ghost workers in 2024.
Aliyu stated this at a breakfast meeting with some members of the Nigerian Guild of Editors in Abuja.
He said the commission also arrested some people for inserting the names of their cronies into the Federal Government’s payroll.
The ICPC boss pointed out that while deductions for workers’ pensions are remitted to Pension Fund Administrators (PFAs), the same cannot be said for ghost workers’ pensions.
He said: “Any deduction made on ghost workers cannot go to any Pension Fund Administrator.
“It will be hanging; so that was the N20 billion recovered.
“We were able to track and recover this amount of money and we also identified people that are inserting ghost workers in the system.
“We even discovered that somebody put his wife, his son, and his in-laws on the payroll.
“He is a 15-year-old boy. We arrested him.
“These are some of the challenges that we are trying to see that we tackle.
“We don’t want to allow this to happen again.”
Aliyu revealed that the commission blocked about N50 billion from being diverted by some public officers in 2023.
