NSS Scandal: Former D-G was posted as volunteer and received GH¢ 8.2 million – Audit report

Findings from the technical and forensic audit of the National Service Authority (NSA), seen exclusively by The Fourth Estate, indicate that the former Director-General of the NSA, Osei Assibey Antwi, while at post as D-G, was at the same time posted as a volunteer within the NSA. This was during the 2022/2023 service year, about a year after he took office as the head of the NSA (then NSS).

Mr Assibey Antwi is said to have been designated a volunteer, assigned an EZWICH card with the number 1177042059, and posted to the Greater Accra region after his registration. But auditors say the payroll records indicate he was assigned to the Kumawu Farms, a 200-acre farmland in the Ashanti Region. The Kumawu Farms, described in media reports as a mixed commercial farming project for service personnel, is an initiative Mr Assibey Antwi’s NSA administration is reported to have commenced when they came into office.  

According to the report, Mr Assibey Antwi was paid GH¢516,000 every month for 16 months, totalling GH¢8,256,000. At the current national service allowance of GH¢715.57, the amount paid to Mr Assibey every month could have paid the allowance of 721 service personnel.

The findings in the audit report align with a previous statement by the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, Dr Dominic Ayine, when he provided an update on the investigations by Operation Recover All Loot (ORAL) into financial malfeasance at the National Service Authority on Friday, June 13.

“In the 2022/2023 service year, a total of eight million, two hundred and fifty-six thousand Ghana Cedis (GH¢8,256,000.00) was deposited into EZWICH account number 1177042059, which is registered in the name of suspect Osei Assibey. Investigations showed that he personally received these funds,” Dr Ayine said.

He added that when his house was searched during the investigations, the EZWICH card was found.

Background

In November 2024, The Fourth Estate concluded its months-long investigations into alleged malpractices at the NSA. The investigations revealed the presence of thousands of ghost names in the database of the NSA, which potentially was causing the nation to lose millions of cedis through what is famously known in Ghana as ‘ghost names’.

But before publication of the report, the leadership of the NSA went to court on the blindside of The Fourth Estate to secure an injunction against the publication of the story.

Following the development, the MFWA, which runs The Fourth Estate project, submitted a petition to the Office of the Special Prosecutor. A similar petition was subsequently submitted to the then newly constituted Operation Recover All Loot (ORAL).

On June 13, 2025, the Attorney General and Minister of Justice, Dr Dominic Ayine, announced to the nation that investigations had been conducted and some former executives of the NSA, alongside other persons, were going to be prosecuted for fraudulent practices at the NSA that had cost the nation over 548 million. In his presentation to the nation, the Attorney-General extoled The Fourth Estate for what he described as the foundational work that had aided his investigations.

“The now-famous National Service scandal, which was first uncovered by The Fourth Estate through its investigative journalism, formed a major plank of the oral report. My office is extremely grateful to The Fourth Estate for the excellent foundational work that they did,” Dr Ayine said.