The Zimbabwean government has allegedly eliminated about 10,000 ghost workers following a biometric registration process conducted in conjunction with the World Bank.
According to the state-controlled Herald newspaper, the ghost workers have been struck off the payroll. The Public Service Commission’s human capital development manager, Moses Mhike, is quoted as saying they worked with some government agencies in tracing non-existent workers.
He told the newspaper that “we conducted a biometric exercise to get the data of all civil servants and comparing with the Registrar’s office. We realized that about 10,000 were not biometric compliant and traced them at each and every work station.”
Another top PSC official is quoted as saying they pulled the plug at the Salary Service Bureau. “We made sure that we stopped paying those non complaint and only the legitimate ones came forward. However, the exercise should be an ongoing thing.”
The government is expected to save millions of Zimbabwe dollars following the elimination of ghost workers, who were estimated by independent economists to be as many as 15,000.