KEY POINTS

• The civil service will suspend pay from February 17, 2025 to any employee who fails to complete identity verification.
• The verification process needs civil servants to provide their TIN and IPPIS number together with their salary account information.
• FG focuses its efforts on removing fraudulent employees who receive illegal salary compensation from ghosts and staff based abroad.

Under IPPIS the Federal Government requires civil servants to finish their identity verification through the deadline set for February 17, 2025 to remove ghost workers from government payroll.

The Office of the Accountant-General of the Federation (OAGF) through its memo announces that not complying with the February 17 deadline will lead to payment cutoff and additional workplace penalties.

All staff members who missed the first deadline to validate their information through the portal have access to complete their validation process.

Employee updates for the system must finalize by 12 midnight on February 17 according to the office-wide memo.

Taxpayer identification now mandatory

The verification process demands employees to submit Taxpayer Identification Numbers (TINs) and combination of IPPIS numbers with salary account details. A significant number of public employees hastily seek to acquire TINs because of the mandatory rule.

Ministries, Departments and Agencies receive active implementation orders from the government to carry out the enforcement of these rules.

Strict measures against payroll fraud

The Nigerian president Bola Tinubu made payroll refund mandatory for public servants working abroad during 2024 and escalated the penalty by punishing their supervising officials.

This recent enforcement campaign further supports government initiatives that aim to make public financial processes more transparent and remove all types of fraudulent payments from the civil service system.