Kogi salary crisis: Ghost workers blackmailing Gov Yahaya-Official

Chairman of the Kogi state Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB) Alhaji Abdullahi Ndalaye has said ghost workers uncovered by the administration of Governor Yahaya Bello are behind the blackmail against his government.

 Ndalaye, however, said the crisis manating from workers’ salary in the state could be traced to the leniency of the governor.

The SUBEB boss disclosed this in Lokoja Sunday during an interactive session with members of the Nigerian Guild of Investigative Journalists (NGIJ) who were in the state for an assessment tour.

He said: ‘If I were Yahaya Bello by now many people will be in jail paying for their crimes and they won’t be saying all that. I have confessional statement of a police officer earning salary from Kogi state government as a civil servant.

”I signed the document published in Leadership newspaper of people with forged certificates and other infractions. These are the same set of people crying that they have not received salaries.

‘They talk about endless screening; you should expect error margin of five or 10 percent in an exercise for over 80,000 civil servants and pensioners. Governor Yahaya Bello is humane and giving people with genuine cases to present evidence(s) to clear their names.”

Ndalaye advised the affected workers with genuine cases to present their certificates and other supporting evidence to the committee for clearance.

Earlier, the Head of Service, Ms Deborah Ogunmola said the governor meant well the state’s civil service as he has introduced reforms to make it more efficient, productive and effective.

Ogunmola disclosed that some people within the system are aware there are problems in the civil service and only a courageous leader can do what the governor is doing.

She explained that the controversy surrounding the screening exercise, adding that the consultant discovered different categories of infractions including using fake certificate to get employment,presentation of fake certificate to earn promotion, failure to present original certificate, falsified date of birth and many others.

The HoS stated that some of the people deregistered from Kogi state payroll were enlisted into the state civil service while in school and diaspora workers who abandoned their duty posts.

”Imagine some people claiming to be Kogi state civil servants are living outside the state, they absent themselves from duty without permission and making constant bank withdrawn in Kano, Kaduna, Abuja, Lagos’,” she said.

She disclosed that over 900 people with cases of omissions were added back to the payroll in 2018, noting that some of those blackmailing government of owing 38months arrears have no evidence of salary payment since 2014 based on bank statement verification.

Ogunmola  said that the governor had pardoned those who altered their date of birth certificates.

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