Payroll Audit Finds 14,000 Ghost Workers, GH₵150m Irregular Payments
A mid-year audit linked to Ghana’s Budget found approximately 14,000 ghost workers on the national payroll, with GH₵150 million in irregular payments made to nonexistent staff—triggering urgent scrutiny and calls for systemic payroll reform. What We Found Vice President Bawumia disclosed that a biometric audit of the National Service Scheme payroll flagged around 14,000 ghost names, saving the state roughly GH₵112 million annually in suspected salary outflows. Earlier efforts led to the identification of over 44,000 ghost workers between 2022 and 2024 on the NSS, saving GH₵356 million. Ghana’s Auditor-General initiated a nationwide payroll audit (Jan 2023–Dec 2024) across MDAs and state-affiliated institutions to eliminate fraudulent entries and recover misused funds. Other regions such as the Northern Region and NSA also purged payrolls—NSA removed over 2,000 ghost names saving GH₵1 million and the Northern region saved GH₵34 million after field […]