Rivers LG Payroll Audit: Fubara Vows to Flush Out Ghost Workers, Rules Out Political Vendetta

In a decisive bid to sanitize the third tier of government, Rivers State Governor Siminalayi Fubara has robustly defended the ongoing local government payroll audit. The exercise, which has generated significant anxiety across the 23 local government areas of the state, is designed to weed out non-existent personnel—commonly referred to as ghost workers—and restore structural sanity to a system long plagued by financial leakages.

Speaking on the necessity of the cleanup, Governor Fubara dismissed assertions that the exercise was conceived as a political weapon to target opponents. According to officials close to the administration, the audit revealed a shocking disparity between the actual workforce on the ground and the astronomical wage bills submitted monthly. The governor emphasized that no sub-national entity can achieve meaningful grassroots development while transferring scarce public funds into the private bank accounts of administrative mercenaries.

Unconfirmed accounts indicate that several local government areas have been operating on heavily inflated payrolls for years, a situation that has allegedly crippled their ability to execute capital projects or maintain basic public facilities. Governor Fubara insisted that the verification exercise is a direct response to this systemic failure. "Our goal is simple: to ensure that Rivers State taxpayers' money is spent on those who actually show up to work and serve the public," the governor reportedly stated during a strategic briefing with key stakeholders.