Six directors and 222 other staff members of the Anambra State Local Government Service Commission have been sacked for possessing fake certificates with which they gained employment into the commission.
In the same vein, two former staff members, one of whom was found to be working with the state owned Nwafor-Orizu College of Education at Nsugbe, and another with Nnamdi Azikiwe University, UNIZIK, Awka, who were said to be collecting salaries for four years have been directed to refund the illegal salaries they received to the commission.
Chairman of the Commission, Mr Vincent Ezeaka disclosed the scandals to newsmen at the Commission’s office in Awka on Thursday.
Ezeaka said that the sad developments were discovered in the ongoing verification and staff biometrics identification exercise being conducted by a four-man committee headed by a retired Permanent Secretary, Dr. (Mrs.) Ndidi Onuigbo.
He added that the exercise is part of Governor Chukwuma Soludo-led administration’s agenda deliberately initiated to sanitise the local government workforce.
Ezeaka further explained that between January and April 2024, a total of 222 ghost workers have been discovered and weeded out of the local government service commission.
He added that the two ex-staff of the commission who collected salaries from the coffers of the commission for four years while at the same time work as staff members of Nsugbe College of Education and the other as an accounting officer with the UNIZIK, Awka whose names he declined to disclose to newsmen would be prosecuted accordingly on the order of the state government.
The local government service boss, however, stated that from the verification exercise the bonafide staff members of the commission currently is about 4, 300, adding that they are the workers in the payroll of the commission pending when the verification committee would conclude it’s assignment.
He stated that the state government is taking serious steps towards ensuring that communities and local government areas are sanitized for things to get better.
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