The minister of information and culture, Lai Mohammed has disclosed how a top official in his ministry was involved in employment racketeering.Lai Mohammed made the disclosure on Thursday, November 24, during an address to members of the Senate committee on culture and tourism on oversight to his ministry.

The minister detailed how he addressed the challenge of employment racketeers in his ministry and agencies, Premium Times reports

He said the racketeers swindled many unsuspected job seekers, promising to give them phantom jobs.

"When I came in, we were able to uncover a number of cartels engaging in unlawful employment.

"They gave bank account details which their victims paid huge sum of money into and after the payment they issued them with letters of employment.

"They even camped some of them in hotels for capturing into Integrated Payroll and Personnel Information System (IPPIS)

"In fact, in a particular organisation, a level 17 Officer was involved in this racketeering, but unfortunately he is late now.

"When we discovered this, we swung into action to get to the bottom of this and get some of them arrested.

"We are still on it and even some of them have taken us to court,'' he said.

The minister assured the Senate of bringing the perpetrators to book, noting that his ministry was committed to fighting the challenge of ghost workers.

Mr. Mohammed said he had directed all the agencies under the ministry to submit their nominal rolls.

He said anyone that failed to do so would have itself to blame for non-payment of its workers' salaries from January 2017.

In other news, Lai Mohammed has said the federal government will continue to take responsibility for the current economic situation in the country.

Mohammed made the remark at the fourth commonwealth public relations congress in Lagos, as contained in a statement by the minister's spokesperson, Segun Adeyemi, Daily Post reports.

According to the statement, the minister said the federal government will stop making excuses about the state of the economy.

Source: http://nignews.com.ng/lai-mohammed-exposes-those-behind-employment-scam/