Corruption hits Nigeria’s police, over 80,000 ghost workers uncovered

The known figure of the number of members in Nigeria’s Police Force is 371,800 but this fell to 291, 685 after a staff count and full integration of payrolls following the implementation of the government’s Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS).

This means that an estimated 80,115 police officers have until now been drawing salaries and benefits running into billions of naira as ghost workers, reports local media Premium Times.

The IPPIS which was introduced in April 2007 has so far saved the Nigerian government billions of money by eliminating thousands of ghost workers.

Mrs Kemi Adeosun, the Minister of Finance, who presented an updated report on the IPPIS at the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting last Wednesday said staff count under the IPPIS has also revealed similar ghost workers in other para-military agencies like the Prison Service, the Immigration Service, and the Nigeria Security and Civil Defense Corps.

The Nigerian police were enrolled into the IPPIS last February to eliminate issues such as delay and illegal deductions in their salaries. Dozens of police officers had earlier kicked against the move with series of demonstrations being held in the capital Abuja.

But the government still went ahead with the move which has so far resulted in the grand corruption exposure in the police force.

The Finance Minister is yet to disclose how much the government has saved following the removal of the over 80,000 additional names on the police payroll.

She, however, said that aggregate savings in personnel costs for all Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) since 2007 was about N288 billion.