By Aliyu DANLADI
The Federal Government says it has saved more than N218 billion on personnel cost since the introduction of the Integrated Personnel Payroll Information System (IPPIS).
The Director, IPPIS, Mr Olusegun Olufehinti, said this on Sunday in Abuja that the system was conceptualised in 2006, but was actualised in April 2007.
He said in 2017 alone, N67 billion was saved, while about 92 Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs), would have been unable to pay salaries due to a deficit in their budget.
“At the end of 2017, we were able to pay all MDAs and in December, we observed that we had N75 billion savings from some MDAs after payment of salaries.
“We also observed that about 92 MDAs would not have been able to pay their salaries because there was a deficit of eight billion naira in their budget.
“However, because we had N75 billion from others, we were able to take eight billion naira from it and then it remained N67 billion which was the net excess we had after paying salaries.’’
According to him, in the past, individual MDAs with such excess will exhaust it without returning anything to the government coffers and yet, the government will be compelled to look for additional money to pay the other MDAs.
Olufehinti said IPPIS was one of Federal Government’s public finance reforms aimed at ensuring that the actual strength of Federal Government workers was known to help in budgeting and annual planning.
He said it would also facilitate storage of updates and retrieval of information and help in blocking wastages and unnecessary expenditure on personnel (ghost workers).
He added that it was very accurate because if a worker had not been captured, the system generated number could not be faked.
“It has helped our budget system because it helps to make provisions for the actual number of personnel. When the system started, the pioneer MDAs claimed to have 55,000 workers but after being captured we discovered that it had been overstated by about 32,000.
“We started with seven MDAs and then extended to 11 more MDAs. As at today, we have captured 586 MDAs, 42 police commands, three paramilitary agencies: the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC), Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS), and Nigerian Prisons Service (NPS).’’
He also said the system had captured some resident doctors from about 50 medical centres and was on the verge of capturing the military- Navy, Air Force and Army.
According to him, the sensitisation for the military will begin on Tuesday, while the actual enrollment commences on July 30. Olufehinti, however, said for now, the revenue generating agencies were not captured on IPPIS.
“If you look at IPPIS, it states that all agencies that draws their personnel cost from the Consolidated Revenue Fund (CRF), are to come on board and these others do not draw their personnel cost from the CRF.
“The Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), are being given commission based on what they generate.
“So such revenue generating agencies that enjoy commission based on what they generate pay themselves. For now, it is only MDAs that are under the Federal Executive Council that are on IPPIS.’’
He added that the judiciary and the legislature had not embraced it but would when they saw the advantage of it.
The IPPIS director said discussions were ongoing with the tertiary institutions, adding that they would be captured soon.
He, however, said implementing the system was quite challenging as MDAs were usually resistant to being captured.
Olufehinti said though some were subtle in their resistance, some were confrontational, while some others tried to buy time for several unjustifiable reasons so they do not have to come on board.
“Naturally, every human being resists change, whether or not it is legal or by compulsion, but for any change to be effective, as a change agent you have to prepare people for it and that is what we have been able to achieve.
“Since the commencement of this administration and with presidential support, there is political will.
“That has made a lot of difference as the MDAs are now being compelled to enroll and even invite us to enroll them so that they are not seen as MDAs that are non-complaint.
“Other challenges are that the MDAs are not focusing much on the area of salary and even where they ought to assist their staff, they push them to us and they direct their staff to come to us for what could have been addressed by them.’’
It would be recalled that the IPPIS payroll aspect is driven by the Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation (OAGF), while the human resource aspect is driven by the Office of the Head of Civil Service (HoCS).
