By Mustapha Darboe
A staff audit by Gambian authorities has uncovered 3,146 absentee employees or ghost workers on the government payroll. This represents a salary bill of at least D10.5 million, Information Minister Demba Jawo has revealed to The Standard.
The full report of the findings of the audit exercise conducted by the Personnel Management Office, PMO, is expected to be released soon. It represents an annual loss of D125 million to the Gambia Government, Minister Jawo said.
“This is quite a larger number given that The Gambia has a civil service population of about 40,000 people,” Jawo said.
The Gambia Government has recently made some cuts on public spending due to constraints on the economy and the minister said the staff audit result will help government with savings of about D125 million a year.
The findings indicate that the population of The Gambia civil service almost doubled within just a decade from 28,617 in 2007 to 40,681in 2017. For the first time in the history of the country, the staff audit included the security services, Jawo added.
