The current parliament building in Juba | Credit | Eye Radio

The Ministry of Labor and Public Service has discovered that the number of support staff at the national legislative assembly are more than the number of the members of parliament.

A headcount conducted in July revealed that the payroll at the national parliament was bloated.

The ministry initiated the exercise to identify ghost-names within the payroll system.

According to the Undersecretary of Labor and Public Service, most of those on the payroll were not approved for hire by the ministry.

The chairperson for information committee at the TNLA, Hon. Juma Yoane, says the parliament has been given 10 days to justify why it recruited more staff without following the hiring process of the government.

“We thought it would be better to bring it [list] back to the institution to see for themselves how it looks like,” he told Eye Radio on Friday.

In response, the Clerk at the National Legislative Assembly, Hon. Makuch Makuch admitted there was erroneous recruitment.

He promised that the parliament will address the matter within the given time.

“We are going to correct it. Within 10 days, I will give reports to my counterpart in the Ministry of Labor and Public Service.”

There are currently 450 MPs at the Transitional National Legislative Assembly.

The government is often accused of nepotism, with senior government officials reportedly having their relatives’ names (even the dead) on payroll.