The Federal Government has unearthed 1,500 civil servants who joined the Federal Civil Service with fake appointment letters.
Head of the Civil Service of the Federation, Folasade Yemi-Esan made the disclosure in Abuja, on Tuesday, vowing that those identified would be delisted from the Integrated Personnel and Payroll Information System (IPPIS).
Speaking at the National Policy Dialogue on Entrenching Transparency in Public Office Recruitment in Nigeria, she noted that over 1,000 persons were discovered in one ministry, while 500 others were found in other ministries, departments and agencies.
“In the past year, in one ministry alone, over 1,000 individuals bearing fake letters of appointment were detected.
“The office recently received a report, from the Federal Civil Service Commission, of over 500 persons in various MDAs in possession of fake letters of appointment.
She added that “Following the Service-Wide Verification Exercise for officers recruited from 2013 – 2020, the commission also requested the suspension of salaries of over 3,000 officers across the MDAs,” she stated.
Yemi-Esan explained that the IPPIS helped to track fake employment, less efficient and unqualified government personnel and that they failed to appear for the exercise and won’t be paid pending further clearance.
She added that as of March, over 380,000 officers had been captured on IPPIS – 66,000 and 320,000 for core and non-core MDAs.
The Head of the Civil Service lamented how corruption thrives in recruitment processes, vowing that the government would clean up the system to reduce job seekers’ contact with public officials.