‘Absentee’ receives Sh390,000 monthly pay for 15 years

A file picture of a sleeping man. [Standard]

A67-year-old man from Calabria, Southwest Italy has been arrested for skipping work for 15 years, yet he collected a monthly salary throughout the period of alleged absenteeism.

The suspect, an employee of the Pugliese Ciaccio Hospital in the city of Catanzar, is alleged to have pocketed a collective remuneration of €538,000 (Sh70.4 million) since 2005, when he was first employed by the facility.

The revelations, as per the BBC, means the suspect has been pocketing an average payment of Sh4.7 million annually, or Sh390,000 monthly.

The Italian media, in their reports, referred to the sexagenarian as the “king of absentees”. According to multiple publications, the man has never set foot at work since 2005.

Italian police arrested the suspect earlier this week, and are investigating him for fraud, extortion and abuse of office, the BBC reported.

According to Italian news agency, Ansa, six managers at the hospital are also being investigated in connection with the suspect’s alleged absenteeism.

The suspect is also accused of threatening his supervisor, the hospital director, against reporting his absenteeism.

After that director retired, neither her successor nor human resources administrators ever noticed his absence, police said.

In 2016, the Italian Government launched a crackdown on absenteeism, after police uncovered a string of cases of public sector workers pocketing pay without turning up for work.