Officers and men of the Nigeria Prisons Service (NPS) have accused their Controller General, Ahmed Ja’faru of illegal deduction of their salaries, hijacking monies in the service co-operative society meant for staff welfare among other allegations.
But the NPS authority has, however, denied all the allegations, saying the concerned staff “are ignorant of the issues,” adding that “no Prisons staff member has his salary domiciled in Prisons Micro Finance Bank anywhere in the country, therefore non receives salary through the bank.”
The aggrieved Prisons staff also revealed that they have petitioned the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and other anti-corruption agencies to investigate the matter.
Sources within the National Headquarters of NPS told Blueprint Wednesday that they have petitioned President Muhammadu Buhari on the “high rate of corruption ongoing under the Controller General, Ahmed Ja’afaru.”
The sources while commending President Muhammadu Buhari’s resolve to fight corruption in the country, said “the Controller General of Prisons is busy thwarting your effort by engaging in corrupt practices in different ways that has thrown the lives of most of his staff to unbelievable situation.
“To his very knowledge the Controller knew that staff salaries were illegally deducted through Micro-Finance bank in the name of over deduction of which the staff are neither owing the bank any facility.
“The staff kept on going to the bank for refunds but the bank says the deducted funds have not been released to them by the Controller General since May, 2017- July 2017 hence the untold hardship.
“In order for him to strike the balance, he went ahead to forcefully retire staff under the guise of fake certificate in order to cover the gap of an illegal recruitment tagged ‘replacement’.
“Those recruited staff with effect from 1st April, 2015, most of them are not getting salaries till date. Whereas those replaced with effect from August 2016 are being paid their salaries.
“He also hijacked monies in the Prisons Cooperative (PRICO) meant for staff welfare, which made staff go into outside borrowing that brought them financial embarrassment.”
But responding, the NPS spokesman, DCP Francis Enobore, who described all the accusations as “mischievous and untrue,” said: “For the record, the PMFB is an independent business outfit of the Prisons Multipurpose Cooperative Society (PRISCO) with its governing board and under the supervision of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the Nigeria Deposit Insurance Company (NDIC).
“Secondly, it is well known that personnel salaries are paid directly from CBN through the Government Integrated Financial Management Information System (GIFMIS) to beneficiaries account and staff members including the CG are at liberty to domicile their pay point in any Bank of their choice.”
