NSS Scandal: Former NSA Boss, Deputy charged in GHC 653 million corruption case after The Fourth Estate exposé

The Office of the Attorney-General and Ministry of Justice has filed multiple criminal charges against the former Executive Director of the National Service Authority (NSA), Osei Assibey Antwi, and Deputy Executive Director, Gifty Oware-Mensah.

The charges follow their involvement in separate but related financial schemes involving ghost service personnel and fraudulent loans.

According to the charge sheet filed at the Accra High Court on October 13, 2025, Mr Antwi is accused of authorising payments to over 60,000 non-existent national service personnel between August 2021 and February 2025, resulting in a financial loss of GHC500,861,744.02 to the state.

Prosecutors further stated that he transferred GHC8.2 million into his personal e-zwich account between August 2023 and May 2024, and unlawfully diverted GHC106 million meant for the NSA’s Kumawu Farm Project, with no evidence of expenditure on the initiative.

The financial loss attributed to Mr Antwi amounts to GHC 615 million. He faces 14 counts, including causing financial loss to the state, stealing, and money laundering.

On her part, the former Deputy Director of the NSA, Gifty Oware-Mensah, has also been charged with five counts, including stealing, willfully causing financial loss to the state, and money laundering.

The prosecution stated that Mrs. Oware-Mensah created 9,934 fictitious names in the NSA database and utilised her private company, Blocks of Life Consult, to secure a GH¢31.5 million loan from the Agricultural Development Bank (ADB).

According to the fact sheets, she claimed her company had supplied goods on a hire-purchase basis to national service personnel. However, investigators found that the names were fictitious and no goods had been supplied.

Funds from the loan were reportedly paid into her company’s account and later transferred to other firms linked to her, causing a total loss of GH¢38,458,248.87 to the state.

Background

Earlier this year, The Fourth Estate published an exposé that uncovered large-scale corruption within the NSA. The investigation revealed the padding of ghost names in the NSA’s database and manipulation of the posting schemes that caused the government to disburse millions of cedis in allowances to service personnel who existed only on paper.

Beyond exposing the existence of ghost names, the publication also raised serious concerns about value-for-money, data security, and the institutional integrity of the Centralised Service Management Platform (CSMP), also known as the Metric App, which was used to manage postings and payments.

Following The Fourth Estate’s revelations, the Office of the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice initiated its own probe. The Attorney-General’s investigation confirmed widespread financial irregularities, revealing that top executives of the NSA, in collusion with private-sector vendors, had mismanaged more than GH¢548 million through fraudulent entries and ghost names.