Despite the introduction of the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS), the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) has uncovered 22,074 suspicious personnel on the payroll of the Federal Government.
The commission also discovered that the government paid N37,103,337,614.40 last year to the suspicious workers.
The affected personnel were located in Ministries, Departments, Agencies, tertiary institutions and the Nigeria Police Force (NPF), which was more allegedly culpable.
In the MDAs, 12,714 personnel were on the payroll but not in the service-wide nominal roll between January and December last year. The monetary value of the 12,174 personnel was put at N34,808, 740,634.37
About 4,190 ex-policemen were found on the IPPIS payroll.
These highlights were contained in the report of a comprehensive review of the IPPIS by the commission as part of the anti-corruption system review by the administration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
Investigators have discovered that the IPPIS have been tampered with, manipulated and allegedly padded with ghost workers or suspicious personnel.
According to ICPC investigators, there were many cases of fraud in the IPPIS in the payroll of the MDAs and the Nigeria Police Force (NPF). Some of the corrupt practices in 20 MDAs include; receiving of double salary, inclusion of names on IPPIS; use of fictitious names to divert public funds; operation of two IPPIS accounts; and ghost workers.
For instance, about 95 personnel across all the MDAs had their names on the payroll and the nominal roll but their names were “not the same with the names that came up when verified via banking application.
Eight of the 95 suspicious beneficiaries have “the same family name and one of them is linked to two IPPIS accounts.”
Twenty four workers from about 20 MDAs were allegedly “receiving double salary from their respective agencies and at times from another.
At the Ministry of Works, 212 officers on the IPPIS payroll with a monthly monetary value of N31,986, 324.40 are not in the nominal roll of the Ministry and the service wide nominal roll of IPPS. The commission said: “The general overview of the Nominal Roll and Payroll of MDAs furnished by IPPIS and subjected to an analysis established a quantum disparity of 12, 174 personnel between the two parameters (nominal roll and payroll) used in the analysis. “The said 12,174 personnel were visibly on the payroll but not on the service wide nominal roll between January and December 2023.
“The monetary value of the 12, 174 personnel is put at N34,808,740,634.37 within the period under review. Included in the service wide disparity between the payroll and the nominal roll were the specific discoveries made from some MDAs used as a pilot scheme.”
But the fraud was allegedly more entrenched in the Nigeria Police Force with thousands of ex-employees on the payroll.
The report added: “The analysis of NPF payroll focused on December 2023 nominal and payroll obtained from IPPIS for the purpose of comparison. The nominal and payroll have populated names of 350,028 and 312,047 respectively.
