John Dramani Mahama, the President, has instructed an immediate probe into the operations of the National Service Authority following the identification of 81,885 potential ghost names on its payroll.

The National Investigations Bureau (NIB) has been tasked with thoroughly investigating how the fraudulent entries, which appear to be ghost names, were added to the payroll during the tenure of the previous NPP administration. These fake entries came to light following a recent headcount of active National Service personnel.

This headcount was initiated by the Minister for Finance as a crucial step to address and clear the backlog of outstanding allowance arrears, which date back to August 2024. The discovery of these names has raised serious concerns regarding the integrity of the payroll system, prompting the urgent need for a comprehensive inquiry into the matter.

The exercise uncovered that although the previous management of the Authority had submitted 180,030 names for payment, only 98,145 were confirmed as legitimate personnel. After the headcount, the Ministry of Finance allocated GHS 226,019,224 to cover the allowance arrears for the genuine service personnel. This indicates that over 81,000 names were fraudulent, potentially resulting in the state losing hundreds of millions through these bogus payments.

In reaction, President Mahama has ordered the newly appointed leadership of the Authority to quickly introduce reforms to prevent future fraudulent activities. He emphasized the need for stronger oversight and accountability measures to safeguard public finances.