Age Falsification: Delta Govt Dismisses 200 Personnel

By Ayodele Oni

An ongoing verification of documents of civil servants in Delta state has led to at least 200 personnel to lose their job.

They were dismissed for document falsification and forgery.

Those affected allegedly either altered their age documentation or presented fake and or altered academic certificates.

They were axed after their infractions were spotted by the State Civil Service commission during an intense staff audit.

The audit has yet to cover all segments of the service and those behind it are hopeful of uncovering many more infractions.

Disclosing these in a media chat in Asaba, the Chairman of the State Civil Service Commission (SCSC), Chief Roseline Amioku, said the sack was with immediate effect.

Amioku, who doubles as Chairman of the Screening Committee, said the move had helped restore the integrity of the SCSC.

She added that the shock finds were the outcome of the probe by the commission based on the intelligence provided by whistle blowers.

According to her, some of those spotted should have retired five years earlier, but had fraudulently remained in service by ingeniously altering their age declaration documents.

“A lot of people are blowing whistle to us. We decided to act swiftly by investigating and looking at the files of civil servants. We found out that hundreds of civil servants who are supposed to have retired five years ago are still in service receiving salary.

“So, it was based on this that the Delta State Civil Service Commission decided that the screening exercise was worth undertaking. Many of them reduced their age to the extent that their own children are now senior to them.

”Over two hundred civil servants have been retired over age falsification already. And we have just started. We have not done fifty per cent of the exercise which is going to continue till next year. We are screening the entire workforce of Delta State.”

Mrs Amioku pointed out that the State Government was on course and called on Deltans to disregard the wrong narratives being speculated to the effect that that the government was merely forcefully retiring civil servants in order to cut the huge wage bill it was saddled with.

She claimed that the ongoing screening exercise in the state had revealed that “the majority of those still working in the public service are above working age.”