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Justice Binta Nyako of the Federal High Court, Abuja has granted a confiscation order of N941,994,079.86 relating to ghost workers in various Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) of the Federal Government.
The judge granted the order following an ex parte application filed by the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offenses Commission (ICPC) on behalf of the Federal Government, seeking the confiscation of funds believed to be the proceeds of unlawful activities.
(ICPC) said it uncovered a ghost worker scam during an investigation into the Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS) that allegedly involved hundreds of fictitious civil servants in several MDAs.
As part of the legal process, the ICPC said it had published the names of 910 alleged recipients of the alleged fraud in the Daily Trust and The Punch newspapers on March 18 2026, inviting anyone with a legitimate claim to the funds to come forward.
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According to the commission, the investigation stems from a 2023 study of the system that uncovered widespread irregularities in IPPIS and uncovered numerous ghost workers on the payroll of government agencies.
Following the findings, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu approved a comprehensive audit of the payroll platform, leading to a joint investigation by the ICPC and the Office of the Accountant General of the Federation (OAGF) in April 2024.
Investigations reportedly uncovered 587 suspected ghost workers on the IPPIS platform.
The Commission said investigations revealed that fictitious IPPIS identities had been created for non-existent personnel at several MDAs, with salaries allegedly paid over several years to bank accounts belonging to individuals and companies. In some cases, the account names did not match the names of the claimed employees, while some accounts allegedly received multiple salary payments simultaneously.
To safeguard alleged proceeds of crime, the ICPC implemented Post No Debit (PND) restrictions on identified accounts between August and November 2024, freezing funds amounting to N941.9 million.
