By Ebi Kesiena
Ethiopia’s Federal Chief Auditor, Meseret Damtie, has presented a damning report to the Ethiopian Parliament, revealing significant corruption and a lack of accountability among government officials.
Appearing before the House of People’s Representatives, Auditor Damtie disclosed the findings from the fiscal year, highlighting that numerous government departments have been disbursing salaries to non-existent employees. This practice, involving “ghost workers,” is one of the many corrupt activities identified.
The Federal Auditor’s office conducted approximately 43 follow-up audits for the 2023/2024 fiscal year, uncovering corruption amounting to hundreds of millions of birr. The report revealed that multiple departments continued to pay salaries to individuals who had either been terminated or were no longer employed.
A total of 92 government offices were instructed to return 443,023,864.91 million birr to the Ministry of Finance. However, only 11 percent of this amount, approximately 48,217,965.67 birr, was recovered.
Auditor Meseret stressed the urgent need for accountability, urging the parliament to take decisive action against the offices that failed to comply with the audit findings from the previous fiscal year.
A news update from the House of People’s Representatives quoted Meseret as saying, “Audited Federal public service offices must take corrective measures to fix audit gaps. Institutions needing accountability have been reported, including to the office of the Prime Minister.”
Additionally, the Immigration Citizenship Service was implicated in the corruption scandal. Despite lacking legal authority to impose penalty fees on clients who missed passport-related appointments, the office collected such fees independently.
Between September 2023 and January 2024, the office bypassed government procedures, opening a bank account and amassing approximately 17.9 million birr. Funds from this account were inappropriately disbursed to employees as “overtime pay” and holiday gifts, actions not authorized by the government.
Corruption in Ethiopia has reportedly escalated to unprecedented levels during Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s six-year tenure, permeating all levels of the public sector. And the problem has been described as one that is pervasive across the public sector involving all levels of government officials.
