Rauf Oyewole, Bauchi
The Bauchi State Government said that it uncovered 100 health ghost workers in its payroll, while planning to sanction the culprit according to civil service law.
Executive Chairman, Bauchi State Hospital Management Board, Mr Sambo Alkali, said this while briefing journalists on Wednesday night. He said that all the identified ghost workers’ names would soon be submitted to Gov. Bala Mohammed and subsequently be dealt with, according to the civil service rules.
“We are currently working on a verification exercise to fish out all those ghost workers people have been talking about.
“Recently, we have done it in our five facilities and we came up with more than 100 ghost health workers which will ultimately be submitted to the governor and they will face the consequences of the civil service.
“What we are doing in Bauchi to curtail the issue of shortage of doctors which is a global issue is that the governor has approved a scheme which is giving us a beautiful result.
“What we have currently, we do engage almost more than 40 doctors on that scheme ranging from consultants to medical officers which are carefully selected and scientifically distributed based on the data available.
“This is a pull system that brings all the professionals onboard. We also supervise our facilities and we are mandated by the governor to come up with all the gap analysis to improve the service delivery,” he said.
Alkali further explained that the governor has also mandated the state committee on health to come up with a healthcare scheme of service that would address not only the salary issue, but also attract doctors and other healthcare professionals to work in Bauchi.
The plan, he said, was to equate the health workers’ salary in Bauchi to that of the Federal Government, adding that this is at the verge of completion and to be submitted to the governor for onward implementation.
Also, Muhammed Dambam, the state’s Commissioner for Health, said the governor has reiterated commitment to collaborate with relevant agencies and partners to establish Ready to Use Therapeutic Food (RUTF) in the state to reduce malnutrition among children.
Dambam, who said that the governor has also pledged to improve the recapitalization of the drugs and medical consumables agency in the state, added that he promised to channel N250 million to the agency this year just as he did in 2024.