The Cross River State Government and the state chapter of the Nigeria Union of Teachers have clashed over allegations surrounding the discovery of thousands of ghost workers within the local government payroll system.
The disagreement became public during a meeting held in Calabar on Monday. The meeting was organised by the Commissioner for Local Government Affairs, Mr Victor Felix Idem, and attended by labour leaders alongside key education stakeholders. The gathering followed an earlier protest by the Nigeria Union of Teachers, where the union accused the government of failing to pay several teachers their salaries for previous months.
The union also complained about delays in implementing promotions for some of its members. Speaking during the meeting, Idem explained that the government uncovered major irregularities during a worker verification exercise involving the submission of Bank Verification Numbers. According to him, more than 2,000 teachers and several local government employees submitted suspicious or invalid BVNs during the exercise.
“We discovered 1,200 fake BVNs in the LG councils, 526 in the primary health centres, 643 political appointees and 2,000 in the State Universal Basic Education Board (SUBEB).”
The commissioner alleged that while some BVNs were completely fake, others were connected to multiple identities, raising fears of payroll fraud and the existence of ghost workers in the system. He stated that the verification exercise was introduced to clean up the payroll structure and ensure that only legitimate workers receive salaries from the government. Idem also rejected claims that workers were being paid half salaries by the ministry. He insisted that salary payments were handled directly by local government councils and not by his office. He challenged the teachers union to provide proof of workers who allegedly received incomplete salaries, including payslips and records of affected employees.
In response, the Chairman of the Cross River chapter of the Nigeria Union of Teachers, Mr Gregory Olayi, defended the union’s complaints. He expressed concern over unpaid salaries and issues surrounding promotion implementation. Olayi revealed that several teachers had not received salaries since September despite complying with government instructions to submit payroll information and BVN details. He further alleged that some teachers noticed reductions in their salaries after promotion adjustments were implemented. Despite the disagreement, the union leader supported the government’s payroll verification exercise, stressing that removing ghost workers was necessary to protect public funds.
He urged the ministry to maintain better communication with labour unions to avoid misunderstandings and unnecessary public disagreements. Olayi also promised to provide records that would help clear genuine teachers wrongly affected by the exercise.
Also speaking at the meeting, the Auditor General for Local Governments, Mr Bassey Eko, said authorities were reviewing promotion implementations to confirm approvals and determine their financial impact.
He disclosed that SUBEB had been directed to submit complete records of promotions and implementation details. According to him, failure to provide the records resulted in the suspension of salaries for some workers. Eko maintained that the ongoing verification exercise was necessary to strengthen accountability and prevent payroll fraud within the local government system.
