Osun govt rejects consultant’s claim over payroll verification

TUNDE ADELEKE, Osogbo

The Osun State Government has rejected claims by Sally Tibbot Consulting (Nig.) Ltd, that it was attempting to cover up the indictment of ghost workers in the state public service.

The state government described the company’s claims as a calculated attempt to blackmail the government into accepting a fraudulent staff audit report.

It would be recalled that Sally Tibbot Consulting Limited, a Lagos-based forensic audit firm, accused the Osun State Government of failing to implement its report that exposed N13.7 billion in annual payroll fraud.

The firm said it uncovered the fraud during a payroll verification and audit it conducted at the government’s behest.

However, the state government, in a statement by the Commissioner for Information and Public Enlightenment, Oluomo Kolapo Alimi, said the consultant’s unusually high figure of alleged ghost workers raised red flags and necessitated a re-verification exercise.

He added that the re-verification revealed that a vast majority of those earlier labelled as ghost workers were legitimate employees and retirees of the state.

In his words, “Upon the receipt of the report of the exercise carried out by Sally Tibbot Consulting (Nig.) Ltd, in order to avoid a situation where an honest worker would be declared a ghost worker only by reason of such worker’s absence from verification, especially if the reason for such absence is ill-health, the Osun state Government carried out an in-depth analysis of the report, and the following was discovered:

“Out of the total number of 8,448 workers declared by Sally Tibbot Consulting (Nig.) Ltd as unseen workers, the Osun State Government was able to confirm 8,015 as active workers while 433 workers were found to be unreachable.

“Also, out of the total number of 6,713 retirees declared as ghost workers by Sally Tibbot Consulting (Nig.) Ltd as unseen workers, the Osun State Government was able to confirm the existence of 5,830 retirees while 883 could not be reached.

“The implication of this is that the percentage claim payable to Sally Tibbot Consulting (Nig.) Ltd reduced drastically by virtue of the fact that the said Sally Tibbot Consulting (Nig.) Ltd attempted to reap where she did not sow by inflating the number of ghost workers/retirees to 15,161 when in actual fact, the unseen workers/retirees are about 1,316.”

He added that “It should be emphasised that the state government stands by the recommendations of its re-verification committee which stated as follows:

“That the total emolument (gains) to the (Government from the unseen personnel is Twenty-seven Million, Seventy, Seven Thousand, Eight Hundred and Forty-Seven Naira, Sixty Kobo (N27,077,847.60) only as opposed to One Billion, Three Hundred and Fifteen Million, Three Hundred and Seventeen Thousand, Six Hundred and Sixty-four Naira, Three Kobo (NI318,3 17,664.03) given by the Consulting firm.

“That the main Committee was of the conviction that enough time and action have been taken on the re-verification exercise, based on this, it recommended as follows:

“That the salaries and pensions as well as palliatives of the unseen staff (active and retirees) be permanently stopped with effect from July 2025.

“That the Consultant be paid the sum of Forty-eight Million, Seven Hundred and Forty Thousand, One Hundred and Twenty-five Naira, Sixty-eight Kobo (N48,740,125.68) representing 159% of the annual gross salaries and allowances the re-verification enabled the Government to save in one year in line with Section 3(3.1) of the MoU between the State Government and the Consulting firm on the exercise.”