2 804 ‘GHOST’ CIVIL SERVANTS RESURFACE, 390 PENDING

MBABANE – Is this a miracle? For over three years, the civil service has been failing to account for 3 194 public servants; but in 30 days, the Ministry of Public Service finally accounted for 2 804 of its employees. This leaves 390 ‘ghost employees’.

These civil servants are currently not accounted for in the civil service; despite that they are remunerated at the Treasury Department, under the Ministry of Finance. Such employees are referred to as ghost employees - which means someone recorded on the payroll system, but who does not work for the particular institution or organisation paying his/her salary.

Consultancy

According to abyrint, a management consultancy firm, a ghost worker can be a real person, who with or without their knowledge, was placed on the payroll, or a fictitious person invented by dishonest staff.
It is said there are three types of ghost employees.

There could be fictitious persons who are invented by someone with influence; real persons who through collaboration and or kick-backs for jobs are featured on the payroll and real people who later leave an organisation or die.

Christian Ntshangase, the Minister of Public Service, said ministries have accounted for almost all employees except for 390. The accountability displayed by the ministries comes after an order that was given to principal secretaries (PSs) last month by Ntshangase.

The minister had ordered the PSs to verify personnel in their charge in a quest to account for the 3 194 civil servants who were not accounted for during the compilation of the Public Service Payroll and Skills Audit Report. The PSs are controlling officers in the various ministries.

“Regarding ghosts employees, so far where we have issued an ultimatum saying that if these employees are not verified, their salaries will be frozen. I must say I am hopeful that by end of March, all employees will be enumerated,” Ntshangase said.

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