The Nigeria Police Force has emerged as the federal institution with the highest number of suspected ghost workers uncovered by the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) in its ongoing nationwide payroll verification exercise.
The anti-corruption agency disclosed that investigations into payroll fraud across federal government institutions have so far uncovered 908 suspected ghost workers in at least 50 Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs), leading to the recovery of about N942 million allegedly paid out as fraudulent salaries.
ICPC Chairman, Musa Adamu Aliyu (SAN), made the disclosure while speaking on the commission’s nationwide payroll audit, according to a BBC Pidgin report published on Wednesday.
The commission explained that ghost workers are fictitious individuals fraudulently inserted into government payroll systems to receive salaries. It added that some public officials allegedly inflate payrolls by including relatives, friends or associates who are not legitimate government employees.
Aliyu revealed that investigators uncovered one particularly striking case involving a government official who allegedly enrolled members of his immediate family on the payroll while also diverting the salaries of several genuine workers.
According to him, the suspect allegedly placed the names of his wife, son and mother-in-law on the payroll in addition to collecting the salaries meant for 12 workers.
Providing a breakdown of the findings, the ICPC chairman said the Nigeria Police Force accounted for the largest number of suspected ghost workers discovered during the exercise.
“For this operation, we identified 570 people whom we suspect are among the fake workers collecting salaries without working,” he said.
The National Water Resources Authority ranked next, with the commission identifying 80 suspected ghost workers.
“For this agency, we identified 80 names of people collecting salaries even though they are not workers of the agency,” Aliyu stated.
The Federal Ministry of Works recorded 56 suspected ghost workers, while 24 were identified in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
The Ministry of Defence also featured on the list of affected institutions.
“For the Ministry of Defence, we identified 19 people acting as fake workers,” the ICPC chairman said.
The commission further listed the Federal Ministry of Electricity and the Federal Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment, with 17 suspected ghost workers each, while the Federal Ministry of Health recorded 15.
The Office of the Head of the Civil Service of the Federation was also cited, with 12 suspected ghost workers identified during the verification exercise.
Although the Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation and the Federal Ministry of Interior were equally named among affected institutions, the ICPC did not disclose the number of suspected ghost workers allegedly uncovered in the two establishments.
The commission said its investigation into payroll fraud, which commenced in 2024, is still ongoing as efforts continue to eliminate fraudulent salary payments from the Federal Government’s payroll system and hold those responsible accountable.
(Ripples)