The Maluti-a-Phofung Local Municipality is currently conducting a head count of all its employees in a bid to crack down ghost employees who are largely responsible for draining the municipality’s finances.

A discrepancy came to light last month, regarding the total workforce of the municipality. One record showed the municipality to be having 1210 employees while another reflected an inflated 1462.

This is what prompted the authorities to startthe counting of every worker, a process that involves capturing every employee’s photo and verifying the authenticity of their identity document.

The acting executive Mayor of Maluti-a-Phofung, Vusi Tshabalala, confirmed that the process is already underway in QwaQwa, Kestel and Harrismith.

“Together with the office of the acting municipalmanager, we have established that there were dead people on the municipality’s payroll. This means we are being ripped off. We have also discovered that people who no longer work here still earn salaries.

“We have evidence of one person who is residing in Johannesburg but is in our payroll; we have already contacted that person,” disclosedTshabalala.

He maintained that conducting a head count is the only way to verify the exact number of people who actually work for the municipality.

“We already have cases of employees who do not match their ID photos. We are still in the process of counting and the exact number of fictitious employees has not yet been fully determined.”