1,000 ghost workers could be on our payroll, Nyaribo tells senators

Nyamira Governor Amos Nyaribo has admitted that his administration could be having between 500 and 1,000 ghost workers on its payroll.

He made the remarks after Senators questioned the rationale for using 45 per cent of the total budget to pay wages and salaries.

Yesterday, Nyaribo told the Senate County Public Accounts Committee that his administration had commenced an audit of its payroll to weed out ghost workers.

“It is true, we have not kept fiscal order for many years. We could have between 500 and 1,000 ghost workers. We have engaged a private firm from the directorate of personnel management to carry out the audit with the report to be out in a month’s time,” Nyaribo told the committee chaired by Homa Bay Senator Moses Kajwang.

Irregular promotions

Nyaribo said the audit will also focus on irregular promotions where some workers have been hired and promoted without requisite qualifications

The admission by the Governor that the County could be riddled with ghost workers comes on the backdrop of the  Auditor General’s report for the financial year ended June 2020, which faulted the county government for irregularities in personnel management leading to an unsustainable wage bill.

Nyamira Senator Okong’o Omogeni demanded to know the approximate number of ghost workers in the County.

“How many unaccounted-for staff, or the so-called ghost workers, do you have?” Omogeni posed.

The report revealed that the compensation of employees amounted to Sh2.7 billion representing 45 per cent of the country’s total expenditure of Sh6 billion that year.