Last week, the Sally Tibbot Consulting Nigeria Limited pulled the trigger on a Television programme, discharging a metaphorical bullet at the Osun State Government headed by Governor Ademola Adeleke, the ebbulient governor currently warming up for the race for his second term tenure, come August 15, 2026.
The forensic audit firm accused the Adeleke admnistration of insincerity in their business transaction on verification and payroll of the state workforce conducted in May/June 2023. It accused the government of N13.7 billion fraud allegedly dug out in the course of the audit and particularly extended the allegation to the door of Chief of Staff to the governor, Alhaji Kazeem Akinleye, chairman of a committee assigned to implement the audit report.
TheTabloid.net gathered that the state government engaged the company in its determination to cleanse the state of fiscal filth with a view to achieving transparent governance in line with its manifesto to take the state out of the sorry situation it met it upon inauguration on November 27, 2022.
Most screaming, if not scandalous, of the allegation the firm levelled against the government was its declaration of the incumbent Vice-Chancellor of the Osun State University, Professor Odunayo Adebooye as one of 8,448 ghost workers through whom the state treasury was being sucked like an hungry baby. It also declared that one of past governors of the state, Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola, who was always a regular face at state functions in Osogbo, the state capital and elsewhere, is also among 6, 713 non-existent pensioners.
Although Oyinlola is yet to speak up on the matter, the Vice-Chancellor, whose 249 other staff were included in the ‘ghost workers’, list, had faced media cameras in Osogbo and stated unequivocally his encounter with the Sally-Tibbot Consulting during the verification exercise, expressing his disappointment in certain classification which, he said, was questionable and, thus, objectionable.
“Because the individuals concerned physically appeared, presented valid credentials, and complied fully with the verification process,” he stated.
The scholar asserted and expressed his difference to the section of the report which touches the nerves of the University, saying the section “raises serious regulatory, ethical, and professional questions against the consultant and against the consultant’s expertise as personnel auditor.”
He explained that controversies which trailed the verification exercise are indicative of the audit firm’s alleged misconduct and unprofessional operation, which insulted both dignity and integrity of the university.
The Professor of Plant Physiology and Food Chemistry said, “It is on record, widely reported in the dailies during the audit, that the whole exercise was fraught with various acts of operational misconduct as far as Osun State University employees were concerned.
“Some of these included:
The whole staff members of the University numbering 1017 as of August 2023 were scheduled to be verified in just one day (Friday 18th August, 2023), along with many employees of the State from other parastatals, and they all had to move out of their Campuses to converge at the State Secretariat. The Consultant’s personnel were grossly inadequate and unskilled to cope with this multitude.”
Adebooye further said, “Consequently, all staff members including Professors had to line up under the scorching sun for a long time; The consultant, Sally Tibbot, showed unprecedented arrogance, indiscipline, immaturity and repulsive behaviours in her interaction with UNIOSUN’s staff members. It was so bad that she had to call one of our Professors “a bastard”.
“The reactions that trailed the consultant’s unethical conducts were shamefully loud and disturbing, and severally published by popular newspapers and social media. That led to the consultant’s invitation by the Osun State House of Assembly to appear before it on 22nd August, 2023. In fact, dissatisfied with her explanations and apologies, the Assembly had to rule that the exercise be suspended.”
Before the VC’s weekend meeting with journalists in his office, Commissioner of Information and Public Enlightenment, Oluomo Kolapo Alimi had equally taken on the audit firm in another media chat during which he made a clarification that the exercise for the state civil service was an investigation of the four-year tenure of the immediate past admnistration led by Alhaji Gboyega Oyetola from 2018 to 2022.
Amplifying more explicitly the commissioner’s clarification, Spokesperson and Special Adviser (Media) to the governor, Mallam Olawale Rasheed explained that his principal contracted the Sally-Tibbot first on good faith and second for the interest of the state economy.
While featuring on the Arise Television, Rasheed stated, “So if there is any so-called N13 billion fraud uncovered by Sally Tibbot, it means it was a fraud perpetrated under Governor Oyetola. In other words, if there is a payroll fraud as the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the Sally Tibbot firm were saying, it is a fraud committed under the immediate past administration.
The spokesperson was not done with his counter-offensive to the opposition APC, he said, “What the press conference held by the APC in Osogbo on Friday meant was that the party was accusing their own boss of a yearly N13 billion scam which amounted to N52 billion payroll scam under former governor Oyetola.”
Rasheed added, “Governor Adeleke wanted to get rid of any fraud in the system and that was the reason why he engaged Sally Tibbot but when the firm came onboard, it was a tug of war for a year. The state was turned upside down.”
In the controversy, name of the governor’s elder brother, Dr Deji Adeleke, was mentioned by the audit firm. Rasheed acknowledged this and washed Adeleke’s hand off any scandal or semblance of it on this audit matter.
He said Adeleke only suggested to his brother not to close his eyes to the report but take another look at it to serve interests of both parties, a counsel which resulted into a report review committee, comprising representatives of the consultant, civil societies among others.
He explained, “It was the governor who took the consultant to Dr Deji to speak on so-called discovered ghost workers. She was not there to submit the audit report to Dr Adeleke. The report was already submitted several months earlier. Her visit was to answer those complaining about being declared ghost workers”
“It was at the meeting that known names like Vice Chancellor of Osun State University and other known figures were discovered to have been listed as ghost workers. It was at the meeting that Sally Tibbot admitted that the payroll system she was paid was not ready and untested anywhere in the federation. Which governor will implement that type of report?”
Rasheed also stated that the technical team of the Sally-Tibbot admitted that the payroll system that was developed was not ready and had never been tested. He said, “The governor deserves commendation for not imposing an untested system on the state. The administration acted well by eventually adopting the World Bank supported system called SIFMIS.”
The governor’s spokesperson also said the consulting firm boycotted the review committee meetings, adding that the committee discovered that the figure quoted by the firm as ghost workers was not true.
“The review committee was set up but the firm representatives boycotted and after the committee’s work, we discovered that instead of the 15,000 ghost workers, it was less than 500 that were not accounted for.
“Also, on the payroll system, since the technical team of the consultant had admitted that the payroll it was developing was not ready and yet to be tested,the governor approved the usage of SIFMIS, a World Bank supported payroll system that was originally developed but unused by the previous administration.
“So, the governor gave an order for the suspension of the implementation of the report by the consulting firm and asked the committee to go back to the World Bank payroll and clean up the payroll system and that was done early 2024,”
As a last resort and his readiness to stand before a neutral law enforcement agency, Adeleke has since taken the matter to the Economic and Financial Crime Commission (EFCC) and the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), both of which he is optimistic would conduct a comprehensive investigation to settle the dust.
“He (the governor) has nothing to hide. The anti-graft agencies will probe the payroll of Oyetola administration and key officials of that administration including the then Finance commissioner will provide details of what happened with their payroll as alleged by Sally Tibbot,” he submitted.
Rasheed said that Adeleke admnistration had since cleansed the state payroll system which, according to him, now runs SIFMIS with high internal capacity and efficiency, using the World Bank framework.
To Sally-Tibbot, it is no retreat, no surrender. In voice and body language, it is a fight to the finish as it stands by its claim against the government.
At the same time, the Osun State Joint Labour Movement comprising the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Trade Union Congress (TUC) and Joint Negotiation Council (JNC), has described the firm allegations as alarming, unacceptable, media propaganda, political insinuations, and public blackmail.
The comrades, thus, warned the company to prepare for a legal backlash should it attempt to “arbitrarily remove workers from payroll based on a questionable audit methodology.”
They alleged Sally-Tibbot of being of pursuing what they called a political agenda when a major election is six months away.
“The continuous appearance of Sally Tibbot Limited on radio, television, and newspaper platforms making allegations suggestive of political motives undermines the neutrality expected of an independent audit consultant,” they said.
The NLC, TUC and JNC further stressed, “It’s a pity that the Opposition who are trying to play politics with the Osun Staff Audit have a short memory, little did they know that the exercise was based on their Administration record, as inherited by the present administration. (Fact check)”
A critical section of public still finds it irreconciliable reason the government awarded the contract to the audit company. They argued that the government failed to carry out a necessary background check on the company, an exercise, they said, could have guided the government in either engaging or keeping it at arm’s length.
They are also unpersuaded on why Akinleye, and not Commissioner of Finance, Mr Ogungbile Olusola was appointed chairman of the audit report implementation committee.
The APC has called for resignation of Akinleye but Rasheed has also promptly come out in his defence, describing him as a reliable gatekeeper who saved the governor and the state from being defrauded.
Nonetheless, all eyes are on the EFCC and ICPC to separate a saint from satan.
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