NSS Scandal: I will advise myself if you fail to file witnesses’ list in seven days – judge tells Gifty Oware-Mensah’s lawyer

An Accra High Court judge, Justice Audrey Kocuvi-Tay, on Tuesday gave the lawyer for the former Deputy National Service Director, Gifty Oware-Mensah, a seven-day ultimatum to provide a list of her witnesses.

Justice Kocuvi-Tay said if Mrs Oware-Mensah failed to comply with the order, which started yesterday, “the court will be forced to advise itself”.

The court had ordered Oware-Mensah to file her list of witnesses on December 22, 2025. But nearly a month later, the accused person has failed to do so.

With the defence failing to heed the court’s directive, the judge said she had “perused the entire records [but] did not find any compliance with the orders of the court”.

She, therefore, asked if the accused person’s legal team had complied with the order.

That was when her lawyer, Gary Nimako Marfo, told the court that she is unable to call any witnesses now to support her defence in the ghost names fraud case against her.

He said his client’s ability to provide witnesses depends on the “case and the nature of evidence” that will be presented by the prosecution.

But Justice Kocuvi-Tay disagreed.

“As already indicated above, these are orders emanating from the law and principles of case management. It is an order given by the court,” she said. “It is not for counsel to choose and pick which orders of the court he would comply with and when it would be complied with.”

She added that the prosecution had already disclosed the nature of the evidence. As such, “cannot be used as an excuse.”

She further asserted that if Mr Nimako had any issue with the order, he should make it clear and timely.

“If, for any reason, counsel is of the view that the orders of the court are not emanating from the principles of law, he must exercise the right timeously to appeal against the same,” she said.

She adjourned the case for the trial to start two days later, January 22, 2026.

The case against Mrs Oware-Mensah was held today because the prosecution, led by Yvonne Atakora Obuobisa, told the court last Thursday that she intended to make “slight” adjustments to the figures contained in their charge sheet.

That has been done.

Background

Earlier in 2025, The Fourth Estate exposed systemic abuse at the NSA. The stories revealed how thousands of ghost names, fictitious or ineligible individuals, including toddlers, 90-year-olds, and people with no verifiable ties to tertiary institutions, were padded into the Authority’s database. These phantom personnel were manipulated through rigged posting schemes, enabling the government to pay out millions of cedis in allowances to non-existent national service personnel.

The exposé went further than merely documenting the existence of these ghosts. It spotlighted profound failures in value-for-money safeguards, data integrity, and overall institutional credibility surrounding the Centralised Service Management Platform (CSMP). Far from serving as a defense against fraud, as NSA officials had publicly claimed, the digital system had been exploited to bypass validation checks, generate fake student index numbers, and facilitate payments to ineligible or entirely fabricated beneficiaries.

The exposé triggered immediate official action. The Office of the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice launched an independent probe, drawing heavily on evidence and leads from The Fourth Estate’s reporting. The Attorney-General’s investigation substantiated the scale of the malfeasance, confirming widespread financial irregularities orchestrated by senior NSA executives in collusion with private-sector vendors.

What began as an initial estimate of losses in the hundreds of millions escalated dramatically. In October 2025, Attorney-General Dr. Dominic Ayine revised the figure upward, stating that fraudulent schemes had resulted in the mismanagement and loss of more than GHS2.2 billion.

Criminal proceedings have since been initiated against key figures, including former NSA Executive Director Osei Assibey Antwi and former Deputy Director Gifty Oware-Mensah, who face multiple charges encompassing stealing, causing financial loss to the state, and money laundering.