A civil servant in Kuwait has been hit with a staggering $1 million fine and a five-year prison sentence after it was discovered he had been paid his full salary for an entire decade without ever showing up for work.
The Decade-Long Deception
Court documents in Kuwait revealed that the unnamed employee, who worked in a citizens' service department, failed to perform any of his duties for ten years. Despite his complete absence, his monthly salary continued to be deposited into his bank account without interruption.
The fraud was only uncovered when authorities finally noticed his prolonged non-attendance. This triggered a criminal case for unlawful enrichment and abuse of public funds. The subsequent ruling, described by the Al Qabas newspaper as one of the toughest in recent years, ordered him to repay double the amount of the salaries he collected, totalling just over $1 million (approximately £769,268).
A Global Pattern of Payroll Fraud
This Kuwaiti case is a stark example of a surprisingly recurrent global issue within public sector administration. It comes amid a concentrated push by Kuwaiti authorities to combat salary fraud and administrative corruption.
In a remarkably similar incident in Germany, a teacher managed to receive her full salary for 16 years while on sick leave. The biology and geography teacher, who went on leave in August 2009 due to chronic illness, should have been assessed by a doctor after three months. This never happened, and her sick leave was systematically renewed.
She was paid 100% of her salary, reportedly between €5,051 and €6,174 per month, despite never returning to the Berufskolleg vocational school in Wesel. The scheme was only uncovered in 2024 following a management change and an internal audit. The school's former director, in post since 2015, had never even met the teacher.
Other Notable Cases of 'Phantom' Workers
The phenomenon of 'ghost' employees is not confined to the Middle East or mainland Europe. In Spain, an engineer named Joaquín García avoided work for six years and was only discovered when he was nominated for a long-service award.
Mr García, dubbed 'el funcionario fantasma' (the phantom official), claimed he stopped going to his job overseeing a wastewater plant in Cadiz because he had no work and felt bullied. A departmental mix-up meant his €37,000 annual salary continued to be paid until his 20th-anniversary award nomination exposed his six-year absence.
These cases collectively expose significant vulnerabilities in public sector payroll and personnel management systems worldwide. They highlight how procedural oversights and a lack of rigorous auditing can lead to massive, long-term financial losses for state institutions.
