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ICPC said under President Muhammadu Buhari’s regime, it has uncovered N49.9 billion tracked as salaries for ghost workers between January and June 2022, adding that the N13.59 trillion 2021 budget was highly padded by the various Ministries, Departments and Agencies, with duplicated projects worth N300 billion.
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The Nigerian anti-corruption agency, Independent Corrupt Practices Commission and Other Related Offences called on relevant committees of the National Assembly to be vigilant to able to detect project duplication in the proposed N19.76 trillion 2023 budget.
ICPC said under President Muhammadu Buhari’s regime, it has uncovered N49.9 billion tracked as salaries for ghost workers between January and June 2022, adding that the N13.59 trillion 2021 budget was highly padded by the various Ministries, Departments and Agencies, with duplicated projects worth N300 billion.
ICPC Chairman, Prof. Bolaji Owasanoye, who disclosed this on Thursday during an interaction with the Senate Committee on Finance, alleged that projects duplication worth N100 billion was also inserted into the N17.12 trillion 2022 budget by some MDAs aside from the N49.9 billion tracked as salaries for ghost workers between January and June this year.
The CEZZATECH reports that the ICPC boss told the Senate Finance Committee that the N300 billion duplicated projects in the 2021 budget and N100 billion in the 2022 budget were tracked through the scrutinisation of approved projects for the various MDAs.
The paper quoted Owasanoye as saying, “N300billion would have been wasted by the Federal government on duplicated projects inserted into the 2021 budget and N100billion for the same purpose in the current fiscal year if not tracked and intercepted by ICPC.
“The same preemptive move, saved the country from spending N49.9billion for salaries of ghost workers put on fictitious payroll by the fraudulent MDAs between January and June this year.”
He didn’t mention the names of the MDAs involved but promised to forward them to the committee.
“The good thing about the preemptive moves made by us is that monies for the fraudulent acts were prevented from being released to the affected MDAs and it is gratifying that the Finance Ministry and Accountant General Office cooperated with us,” he said.
He advised relevant committees of the National Assembly to be on the lookout for such project duplication in the proposed N19.76trillion 2023 budget.
He added, “From our own end, detection of such projects is done by verifying their locations and names, upon which we tell the appropriate authorities not to release wrongly budgeted monies for them.”
The chairman, Senator Olamilekan Adeola, who was delighted by the progress on behalf of the committee said the operational cost of the agency will be increased from N1.8 billion.
He added, “This committee is impressed by proactive ways your commission is adopting in the fight against corruption.
“Your submissions clearly show that all hope is not lost for our dear country as far as fighting corruption is concerned.
“Your operational cost which is N1.8 billion will be increased as the required impetus for more proactive measures against corrupt practices across the various MDAs.”
