The National Service Scheme (NSS) is collaborating with the Police to identify and prosecute thousands of ghost names found on its payroll.
The individuals are said to have withdrawn allowances monthly for years for no work done. However, the introduction of an electronic payment platform this year blocked the names.
Executive Director of the Scheme, Osei Assibey Antwi, told JoyNews’ Erastus Asare Donkor that his outfit is in the process of identifying the suspects for prosecution.
“It was a problem which bedeviled the Service for a very long time, but with the introduction of the metric app, we succeeded in achieving a lot, and because of the app, it would also smoothen and fast-track the process for the deployment,” Mr Assibey Antwi highlighted.
The former Kumasi Major said they will soon publicize the complete list of individuals engaged in the fraud after a series of checks by the Scheme to trace all allied teams.
“Very soon, we’d come out with the figure as to the number we were able to block. So I can say for a fact that we managed to block a lot of numbers and those numbers, we’d come out with it because we’ve got the report ready.”
“We are doing a lot of work on it because there is one thing catching a thief and there is one thing tracing to where the thief is coming from, and another thing is to look whether just one individual or it’s a team. So we are doing those works and after that, we’d come out,” he assured.
Meanwhile, he said prospective National Service Persons (NSPs) who were put on hold have been directed to seek redress at the NSS centres with relevant documents issued to them.
“We have sent text messages to all those on hold; we have given them the items they need to carry with them to go to our centre for them to be taken out of the hold.”
“One was about their student ID cards, one was with their national service application form, and the other one was with their national identification card; we gave them the text messages; so if they’ve not been able to go, why have they not been able to go?” he asked.
