An ongoing staff verification at the National Assembly has led to the discovery of about 150 ghost workers.
According to The Nation, one hundred of the ghost workers were discovered in the House of Representatives during the verification which is part of the measures put in place to reduce the running cost of the legislative arm.
It was gathered that the debt profile of the National Assembly which is put at N17billion has been giving the leadership some concern and is largely responsible for the inability of the management to procure utility vehicles for the lawmakers at once, as well as upgrading of existing facilities and embarking on other projects.
To address the debt and other management issues, following a protest by legislative aides, the management embarked on the staff verification exercise that commenced last year with legislative aides who have been paid only one quarterly allowance of N75,000 per head since the inauguration of the 8th Assembly.
In a memorandum to all lawmakers, details of legislative aides attached to individual lawmakers were requested. This was prompted by reports that some lawmakers employed fewer than the mandatory five aides.
Done with the legislative aides, the management embarked on staff audit exercise whereby all civil servants were directed to physically appear before a panel with their employment letters.
The completion of the physical appearance was followed by physical payment of salary which did not go down well with a number of workers as it was discovered that some workers that turned up for the physical verification failed to show up for the salary table payment.
Sources said some names on the payroll are those of those “have either left the service or transferred from NASS.
“The verification exercise has turned up fundamental discoveries,” one source said.
“Some that have either retired or dead still maintain their places on the payroll.
“The discovery of all these was made possible by the physical audit exercise.
“It is now obvious that the management was just burdened by induced manipulations but I think by the time this is concluded and necessary sanctions applied on those found culpable, the fortune of the institution will begin to improve,” she said.
The staff verification exercise also became imperative following allegations of falsification of appointment details by some senior staff jostling for the position of the Clerk of the House.
Some Directors were alleged to have falsified their age in order to gain undue advantage for the existing vacancies in the management cadre.
According to the source, no fewer than five Heads of Departments, especially those seconded from other establishments have changed their records of service in order to prolong their stay in service.
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