The Gombe State Committee on the Verification of Civil Servants has uncovered 431 suspected ghost workers on the state payroll who did not show up for the recently concluded state biometric verification exercise, leading to savings of more than 31 million, 179 thousand 446 Naira 84 Kobo for the state.
This was disclosed by the State’s Commissioner of Finance and Economic Development Malam Gambo Magaji on Friday, during a press briefing at the State Treasury Office, Gombe.
The commissioner said the data of all the state’s civil servants that of Gombe and Akko local governments areas were digitally captured and documented.He said in Akko Local Government alone, another 134 ghost workers were detected after the exercise, a development he said saved more than 3 million, 940 thousand, 238 Naira 88 Kobo for the local government.
Muhammad Magaji Gambo added that the affected staff were suspended from the state’s payroll, and will be totally dismissed after three months.
The commissioner said the biometric verification exercise for the remaining nine local government areas will soon commence, as the biometric attendance machines will be shortly deployed in all the state’s ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) for effective service delivery to people of the state. He called on all staff and officials in the MDAs to take good care of the machines for proper management and maintenance.
On his part the State Head of Service Bappayo Yahaya, called on civil servants in the state to be punctual in their respective places of assignment, stressing that disciplinary measures are put in place to deal with any erring staff.