The Government through the Ministry of National Treasury has begun a headcount of pensioners in Siaya County.
According to Siaya County Commissioner (CC), Michael Ole Tialal, the ten-day exercise aims at determining the number of retired public servants who were entitled to pension across the region.
Tialal said that the exercise would also help clean the pension payroll by identifying ghost pensioners.
Speaking to the media in his office, Tialal said that the exercise would enable the government to save billions of money that they have been losing to dead and ghost pensioners.
“It was discovered that there are a lot of fraudulent activities which have been going on in various government sectors, including the police force where a headcount also established a number of ghost workers,” he said and called on pensioners from the county to turn up for the exercise.
He said that this would also give the potential beneficiaries who may have not joined the pension scheme due to one reason or another an opportunity to register into the programme as long as they have valid documents to prove that they deserve such payments.
By Philip Onyango