Tanzanian President John Magufuli has sacked nearly 10,000 civil servants for having fake education certificates.
He was responding to the release of a government report into fraudulent qualifications in the public sector.
The education minister said that some had been using their relatives’ school certificates, while others did not appear on official records at all.
President Magufuli has given those on the list until 15 May to resign or face legal action.
The 9,932 people named in the report account for more than 2% of the country’s estimated 450,000 civil servants.
Officials convicted of fraud could face up to seven years in jail.
Last year, Tanzania removed more than 10,000 so-called ghost workers from its public sector payroll in a crackdown on corruption.
Payments to the non-existent employees had been costing the government more than $2m (£1.4m) a month, it said.
When President Magufuli came to power two years ago, the government temporarily suspended recruitment in some government sectors while they checked up on existing employees’ qualifications.
The report focused exclusively on secondary school qualification and did not examine university degree certificates.
Source BBC
