50,000 ghost workers sacked, N200bn saved - Presidency lists 4 major things achieved in 2016

The senior special assistant to President Buhari on media and publicity, Garba Shehu has listed the achievements of President Muhammadu Buhari for 2016.

- SSA to President Buhari on media and publicity, Garba Shehu has released a statement

- The statement released by Shehu lists some of Buhari's achievements for 2016

- The statement also explains how the FG got rid of 50,000 ghost workers

Garba Shehu

Speaking to State House correspondents at an interactive meeting to mark the end of 2016, the senior special assistant to President Buhari on media and publicity has listed the achievements of President Buhari for 2016.

According to Garba Shehu, the federal government payroll has been rid of 50,000 ghost workers, saving the country a huge amount of N200 billion. The amount N13 billion has been taken off the payroll monthly from February to December this year.

Shehu also announced that the 11 people who ran the syndicate of ghost workers have been handed over to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC.

The statement on the SSA's official Facebook page says: "The flagship program of the Muhammadu Buhari administration to rid the system of fraud and instill good governance is on course.

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"Through a notable initiative, the Efficiency Unit of the Federal Ministry of Finance, the government has embarked on the continuous auditing of the salaries and wages of government departments.

"When the the committee was constituted in February 2016, federal government monthly salary bill was N151 billion excluding pensions.

"Now the monthly salary warrant is N138 billion, excluding pensions. Which means that the government is making a monthly saving of about N13 billion. That is from February 2016 to date."

Garba Shehu also revealed that: "the pension bill was 15.5bn monthly as at February. Now it is down to N14.4 billion, which means average monthly saving is made of about N1.1 billion."

Addressing the issue of the 21 Chibok girls released recently, Shehu said they were being taken care of by the FG and that there was a lot of local and international interest in the future plans of the girls.

He said: "A black American billionaire, Mr Robert Smith who is currently sponsoring the education of 24 girls from Chibok, among them the first set set of escapees from Boko Haram at the American University of Nigeria, Yola has offered to pay for the education of the 21 released through negotiations and is offering to take responsibility for all the others who will hopefully be eventually set free.

The Murtala Mohammed Foundation in the country is equally interested."

Some of the parents of the Chibok girls have said they did not have enough room for interaction with their daughters brought home for Christmas by the Department of State Services (DSS).

Garba Shehu admitted that there had been some problems, because some security operatives did not understand the objective of the trip, but that following the receipt of this complaint, a directive had been given from the headquarters for the access by the parents to be eased.

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He assured the complainants: "If the situation persists, pls let us know so that the higher authorities will make a further intercession."

Speaking on the agricultural programs put in place by President Buhari, Garba said that the calls for a return to farming was yielding good results.

He said: "The talk about agriculture has driven people to the farm. This year, there is a huge boom in the rural economy.

"We have witnessed an excellent harvest. Farmers are getting value for their output. What has encouraged farmers the more is the increasing availability of extension services.

"New farming techniques are helping farmers to do their occupation better. The readiness of off takers to buy the produce is also a major boost.

"When you put all these together with the systematic move to curb importation as a boost local production through the restriction of the available foreign exchange to critically important sectors of the economy, you have favorable environment for the diversification of the economy.

" As we speak, several of the country's major manufacturing industries are actively backward-integrating- Nestle, Unilever, the breweries are looking what we have as local materials, changing their formulations to maintain production levels and keep their share of the market.

"Manufacturers who are hooked on import of raw materials are advised to re-strategize and take full advantage of local raw materials. The future belongs to those who employ the use of local raw materials."

Meanwhile, President Muhammadu Buhari has asked governors in the country to pay workers in their states all outstanding salaries and entitlements.

The governors are to make the payments with parts of the at least 25 percent of the refunds made to them from excess deductions for external debt service.

Below is a video of Garba Shehu speaking on Biafra: