Zamfara health board uncovers 80 ghost doctors, 39 nurses

The Zamfara State Health Services Management Board has uncovered 80 ghost doctors and 39 nurses on its payroll.

Speaking to our correspondent on Sunday, the chairman of the board, Alhaji Mustafa Anka, said the ghost doctors and nurses were discovered during verification conducted by the board to ascertain the actual number of staff on the board’s payroll.

He said N20m was paid to these categories of civil servants monthly as salary.

Anka lamented that “the money used to go to a group of people who specialised in looting the state government’s treasury.”

He maintained, however, that the board had taken stringent measures to block the syndicate, adding that “all the names of the ghost doctors and nurses have been removed from the payroll of the board.”

Anka further explained that the board would continue to verify its staff to find out if there were still ghost workers with a view to ensuring that the state government’s funds were property protected.