Gov’t suspends salary of 431 staff over absenteeism

The Gombe State Government said it has suspended 431 workers from its payroll for the month of May, for failure to show up at their respective places of work throughout the month.

The state’s Commissioner of Finance, Muhammad Gambo Magaji, who disclosed this during a press briefing by the “Civil Servants Biometric Exercise Committee”, said the affected staff didn’t go to work throughout the month.

He said the state government saved over N27.1 million from the salaries of the suspended staff of five local government areas in the state and the Specialist Hospital Gombe.

According to him, workers were identified by the state’s biometric attendance programme introduced to checkmate absenteeism and improve productivity of the civil servants.

The commissioner said 109 staff in the state’s specialist hospital did not show up for work throughout the month of April, adding that no attendance was recorded for 70 health workers in the Primary Health Centre (PHC) in Akko.

He added that about 689 other workers had an insufficient attendance in the month under review.

“The committee will investigate to unravel reasons for the insufficient attendance by workers who were supposed to be committed to their work and duties,” the commissioner added.