Zamfara state government, has alleged that the former governor, Abdul’aziz Yari and his former finance Commissioner, who was also the All Progressives Congress, APC, governorship candidate during the 2018 general election, Mukhtar Idris, were involved in salary fraud for several years.
Describing it as “persistent salary racketeering”, it said the alleged fraud, which, according to the government, had been on for several years, was discovered in a first attempt at verifying the pay roll of the state by the new Commissioner of Finance, Alhaji Rabiu Garba Gusau.
In a press briefing with newsmen Saturday, the Commissioner disclosed that a total of 4,972 persons authorised by the former administration of Abdulazeez Yari, to be collecting salaries worth over N216 million monthly, have been found to be irregular.
“Significantly, this irregularities persisted under the supervision of the former Commissioner of Finance under the administration of Abdulazeez Yari, Alhaji Mukhtar Shehu Idris (Kogunan Gusau),” the Commissioner stated, adding that some of the discoveries included non existent staff, who collect monthly salaries and existing staff who collect multiple salaries.
“There are staff whose list is not part of the state civil service but said they were simply authorised to be included in the payroll from the office of the Head of service.”
According to Gusau, there are among them, 1,640 staff whose account numbers are not on the server and another 119 whose names on the payroll differ from the account numbers benefitting from their monthly pay.
“in fact, a check further revealed to us that some names collecting salaries in the state, do not even have account numbers with us. Instead, numbers similar to GSM numbers are what is provided, yet salaries go into certain account numbers at the end of the day”, the Commissioner revealed .
He emphasised that preliminary investigation indicated that the irregularities were allegedly known to and tolerated by the previous administration, “which the Government of Bello Muhammad is now committed to correct.
“We have stopped the payment of these salaries and our investigation will continue and we shall make sure that scarce resources of Zamfara state is no longer siphoned through fraudulent means”, assured.
