[South Africa] Three officials must collude to create one ghost worker

In South Africa, the chairperson of parliament’s portfolio committee on public service and administration has said that the creation of one ghost employee on the public payroll requires the collusion of at least three officials, Mail & Guardian reports.

Jan De Villiers added that the era of treating ghost workers as a clerical irregularity was over.  

At a media briefing by chairpersons of the governance cluster in the National Assembly, Mr De Villiers said, “This is not merely a payroll anomaly. It is a deliberate and orchestrated form of systemic corruption. It is organised crime within the state.

The briefing reportedly came on the tail of a renewed government focus on eliminating waste and corruption in the public sector wage bill, prompted by Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana’s May budget speech. 

The minister announced a comprehensive expenditure review of more than R300 billion in government spending since 2013, using a data-driven strategy to root out inefficiencies, including ghost employees.

Mr De Villiers stated that the portfolio committee, acting on this directive, had been convened on May 28 to interrogate the pervasive and corrosive problem of ghost workers. It concluded that the issue was systemic, criminal and far more widespread than previously acknowledged.

“The Department of Public Service and Administration confirmed before parliament that ghost workers are present across all three spheres of government — national, provincial and municipal. They are also embedded in state-owned entities and agencies,” De Villiers said.

The examples cited were 230 unverifiable employees whose salaries were frozen by the Gauteng Department of Health in May, and R6.4 million in salaries paid to ghost workers in the Mpumalanga Department of Education, uncovered by the auditor general.

During a September 2024 hearing, the standing committee on public accounts was briefed by the Special Investigating Unit (SIU) about the discovery of 1,277 ghost employees in the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa’s (Prasa) system. 

The SIU revealed that Prasa had been losing around R20 million a month in fraudulent salaries. The majority of the agency’s ghost workers were reportedly former employees who had never been removed from the system. It wasn’t an error of omission. The Ziveze Project, which uncovered the fraud, stated that payroll manipulation had become an institutional practice.

De Villiers warned that these were not isolated incidents. “The numbers are staggering. They are not anomalies. They are symptoms of a system that needs structural intervention.”

The creation of a ghost employee required collusion, he said. “At least three officials need to work together to insert a ghost worker into the payroll system. This means we are dealing not with random lapses in judgment, but embedded criminal syndicates.”

Despite current efforts to identify and remove ghost employees through integrated audits between the department and the treasury, De Villiers said more was required. 

“A data audit alone is not enough. Every person drawing a public salary must be verified in person and through biometric identification. The public has the right to know the names on the payroll correspond to individuals who really exist and who serve the public,” he said.

“Currently, the three-tier authentication system used to validate employee status is open to manipulation. Internal controls have failed. Oversight has been diluted. The opportunity for fraud persists because the tools needed to prevent it have not been enforced, and worse, have been exploited by those meant to protect them.”

Departments must take the lead in developing a formalised framework to ensure protection and prevention, and regular audits searching for ghost employees should be carried out, De Villers said.  

He added that the lack of uniformity in how public servants were employed, with each department using its own HR processes without central oversight, was part of the problem.

“We need a national approach, led jointly by DPSA (Department of Public Service and Administration) and treasury, and involving the auditor general, Cogta (Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs) and law enforcement.”

The departments will reportedly reconvene in the third quarter of 2025 to review progress, scope, preliminary findings, and enforcement mechanisms. De Villiers said, “This is not going to be another talk shop.”

Source: Mail & Guardian

(Quotes via original reporting)

In South Africa, the chairperson of parliament’s portfolio committee on public service and administration has said that the creation of one ghost employee on the public payroll requires the collusion of at least three officials, Mail & Guardian reports.

Jan De Villiers added that the era of treating ghost workers as a clerical irregularity was over.  

At a media briefing by chairpersons of the governance cluster in the National Assembly, Mr De Villiers said, “This is not merely a payroll anomaly. It is a deliberate and orchestrated form of systemic corruption. It is organised crime within the state.

The briefing reportedly came on the tail of a renewed government focus on eliminating waste and corruption in the public sector wage bill, prompted by Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana’s May budget speech. 

The minister announced a comprehensive expenditure review of more than R300 billion in government spending since 2013, using a data-driven strategy to root out inefficiencies, including ghost employees.

Mr De Villiers stated that the portfolio committee, acting on this directive, had been convened on May 28 to interrogate the pervasive and corrosive problem of ghost workers. It concluded that the issue was systemic, criminal and far more widespread than previously acknowledged.

“The Department of Public Service and Administration confirmed before parliament that ghost workers are present across all three spheres of government — national, provincial and municipal. They are also embedded in state-owned entities and agencies,” De Villiers said.

The examples cited were 230 unverifiable employees whose salaries were frozen by the Gauteng Department of Health in May, and R6.4 million in salaries paid to ghost workers in the Mpumalanga Department of Education, uncovered by the auditor general.

During a September 2024 hearing, the standing committee on public accounts was briefed by the Special Investigating Unit (SIU) about the discovery of 1,277 ghost employees in the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa’s (Prasa) system. 

The SIU revealed that Prasa had been losing around R20 million a month in fraudulent salaries. The majority of the agency’s ghost workers were reportedly former employees who had never been removed from the system. It wasn’t an error of omission. The Ziveze Project, which uncovered the fraud, stated that payroll manipulation had become an institutional practice.

De Villiers warned that these were not isolated incidents. “The numbers are staggering. They are not anomalies. They are symptoms of a system that needs structural intervention.”

The creation of a ghost employee required collusion, he said. “At least three officials need to work together to insert a ghost worker into the payroll system. This means we are dealing not with random lapses in judgment, but embedded criminal syndicates.”

Despite current efforts to identify and remove ghost employees through integrated audits between the department and the treasury, De Villiers said more was required. 

“A data audit alone is not enough. Every person drawing a public salary must be verified in person and through biometric identification. The public has the right to know the names on the payroll correspond to individuals who really exist and who serve the public,” he said.

“Currently, the three-tier authentication system used to validate employee status is open to manipulation. Internal controls have failed. Oversight has been diluted. The opportunity for fraud persists because the tools needed to prevent it have not been enforced, and worse, have been exploited by those meant to protect them.”

Departments must take the lead in developing a formalised framework to ensure protection and prevention, and regular audits searching for ghost employees should be carried out, De Villers said.  

He added that the lack of uniformity in how public servants were employed, with each department using its own HR processes without central oversight, was part of the problem.

“We need a national approach, led jointly by DPSA (Department of Public Service and Administration) and treasury, and involving the auditor general, Cogta (Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs) and law enforcement.”

The departments will reportedly reconvene in the third quarter of 2025 to review progress, scope, preliminary findings, and enforcement mechanisms. De Villiers said, “This is not going to be another talk shop.”

Source: Mail & Guardian

(Quotes via original reporting)