Payroll Fraud: Dickson Directs Implementation of Report

Bayelsa State Governor, Mr. Seriake Dickson, yesterday directed the implementation of the report of the State Committee on Civil Service Reforms in the state.

Over 4,000 accounts belonging to civil servants had been suspended last year for suspected payroll fraud, following the report by the committee, while the state government instructed those affected to approach the judicial panel of inquiry to clear their names.

The Governor said that the younger generation of unemployed graduates in Bayelsa could only be given gainful employment if the issue of the endemic payroll fraud was dealt with in a decisive manner.

A statement signed by the Special Adviser to Governor Dickson on Media Relations, Mr. Fidelis Soriwei, said the governor made the comment while speaking at an interactive session with Labour leaders in Yenagoa.

According to the governor, while most of the older states in the country have a wage bill of N2 billion, Bayelsa State’s Wage Bill was over N6 billion (State and LGAs) because of the activities of some fraudulent people.

He lamented that the state had the highest wage bill in spite of its low Internally Generated Revenue base which he said was N500,000 million per month on the average.

“By the end of January, implementation of the reforms must commence. We should take out all the people who are falsifying their documents, those involved in fraudulent practices. Bayelsa cannot be for the payment of salaries to people who don’t deserve to earn them.

“I want to build more roads, more bridges; clean up the payroll, so that we can clean up the space for the employment of young graduates. "

The young ones must the employed so that they can earn their living. I don’t think they would be like the ones who would be employed and they go to Lagos and Abuja without working.

“We want people who are productive, we should stop the sense of entitlement, the state payroll should be more than amnesty payroll and those who are employed must be trained and must be productive.

“We want to employ more young people in this state, we have to take out the dead woods, we have to get out these to would wait to get alert without going to work, those without certificates.

“If we don’t take urgent actions, this state will not be able to produce civil servants with the right ethos to compete with their counterparts in other states. We have to work hard to ensure that the state does not grind to a halt. We have to stop crooks from damaging our state.

“However, before we can employ our youths, we should take out all these people who are falsifying documents, those involved in fraudulent practices, those without certificates.”

Dickson, who said that he would not fund the councils with monies from the state government, urged the leadership of the councils to have a workforce which they have the capacity to train, manage and maintain.

“This January, I will not hear that any Council Chairman is not able to pay salaries. I will not also augment your salaries with state money. You are also at liberty to fire those that are not working. You employed them, you are the ones that can fire them.”

Meanwhile, Dickson, has authorised the release of N5.6 billion Paris Club Debt funds received in the state in December to pay one and half months’ salary arrears owed workers during the peak of the economic recession in the country in 2016.

The Governor stated that the state government received a total of N14.8 billion from the Federal Government, saying that the breakdown showed the state received N13.5 billion while the local government councils received N1.37 billion.

Governor Dickson explained that the outstanding salaries arrears were a balance of half salaries he paid for seven months during the recession in 2016.