The creation of a ghost employee on South Africa’s public payroll requires the collusion of at least three officials, the chairperson of parliament’s portfolio committee on public service and administration said on Monday 9 June.
Jan de Villiers warned of entrenched corruption within the state and said ghost workers should no longer be seen as a clerical anomaly.
“This is not merely a payroll anomaly. It is a deliberate and orchestrated form of systemic corruption. It is organised crime within the state,” he told a media briefing of parliamentary chairpersons in the National Assembly.
Improving public sector efficiency
The remarks followed Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana’s announcement in May of a government-wide expenditure review targeting waste and corruption across R300 billion in spending since 2013. The review, which includes identifying ghost employees, is part of a data-driven strategy to improve public sector efficiency.
In response, the portfolio committee met on 28 May to examine the issue and concluded that the phenomenon of ghost workers is widespread, systemic, and criminal.
“The department of public service and administration confirmed before parliament that ghost workers are present across all three spheres of government — national, provincial and municipal. They are also embedded in state-owned entities and agencies,” De Villiers said.
@talkradio702 Transport Minister Fikile Mbalula announced that ghost workers weee paid salaries at PRASA. #702Breakfast #702WalkTheTalk ♬ original sound – Radio702
Unverifiable employees
Recent examples include 230 unverifiable employees whose salaries were frozen by Gauteng’s health department, and R6.4 million in salaries paid to ghost workers in the Mpumalanga education department, uncovered by the auditor general.
In September 2024, the Special Investigating Unit (SIU) reported to parliament’s public accounts committee that it had discovered 1 277 ghost employees in the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (Prasa). This led to estimated monthly losses of R20 million.
Many of those individuals were former employees who had never been removed from the payroll system. De Villiers said the fraud was not accidental.
“At least three officials need to work together to insert a ghost worker into the payroll system. This means we are dealing not with random lapses in judgment, but embedded criminal syndicates,” he said. While audits are underway between the department and the National Treasury, De Villiers said more robust verification was required. “A data audit alone is not enough.”
In-person verification
Every person drawing a public salary must be verified in person and through biometric identification. The public has the right to know the names on the payroll correspond to individuals who really exist and who serve the public.
He criticised the current three-tier employee authentication system, saying it remained vulnerable to manipulation.
“Internal controls have failed. Oversight has been diluted. The opportunity for fraud persists because the tools needed to prevent it have not been enforced, and worse, have been exploited by those meant to protect them.”
De Villiers said departments must lead in developing a formal framework to safeguard against ghost workers. The framework would include mandatory payroll audits, biometric registration, centralised appointment authorisation and digital tracking of attendance and performance.
The committee would also call on the auditor general to include internal ghost employee audits as a standard requirement in departmental and entity reviews.
“We will push for disciplinary and criminal action to follow every detection of ghost workers. Names must be handed over to the SIU, the Hawks and the South African Police Service,” he said. “Fraudsters must not be shielded by departmental silence or internal collusion.”
The consequences of inaction were serious, De Villiers added. “Every ghost worker represents a post that could have been filled by a qualified graduate, a dedicated nurse, a teacher at a rural school, or a social worker supporting the vulnerable.”
He said the committee would prioritise cleaning up the PERSAL system — the government’s central HR and payroll system — during the seventh parliament.
All departments and SOEs haunted
Asked which departments were most affected, De Villiers said the problem was spread across all departments and state entities. “Every single department, agency, level of government, and state-owned enterprise probably has ghost workers.”
However, he added posts involving out-of-office work were more easily exploited. The lack of uniformity in HR systems across departments also contributed to the problem.
“We need a national approach, led jointly by DPSA and Treasury, and involving the auditor general, Cogta and law enforcement.”
According to De Villiers, departments would reconvene in the third quarter of 2025 to review progress and enforcement measures.
