The Minority in Parliament has accused the New Patriotic Party (NPP) of secretly recruiting New Patriotic Party (NPP) thugs into the security services, stressing that the 2018 list of qualified police recruits was replaced with a list of these persons.

In a press statement released on Wednesday October 30, 2019 and signed by James Agalga, the ranking member on the Defence and Interior Committee of Parliament, they accused the Interior Ministry of secretly recruiting persons into agencies under the ministry “in total disregard of established procedures for the recruitment of personnel into those agencies” in favour of “those connected to the NPP in one way or the other.”

“The attention of the Minority in Parliament has been drawn to an ongoing recruitment exercise of personnel into agencies under the Ministry of the Interior namely; the Police Service, Prisons Service and the Ghana Immigration Service in total disregard of established procedures for the recruitment of personnel into those agencies,” the press statement states in its opening paragraph.

The statement then detailed how the government halted the lawful process of recruitment into the police service and replaced the list of properly selected and qualified candidates with a list provided by the government:

“In specific reference to the Police, sometime in 2018, the government of President Akufo Addo announced that financial clearance had been given for the recruitment of 4000 personnel into the service. Accordingly, the service advertised for the recruitment of 2000 in the first instance, whereupon, prospective recruits applied through the e-recruitment model. The applicants, we are reliably informed went through all the necessary procedures including meeting the academic requirement of having a minimum of six credits (Maths and English inclusive), taking part in a competitive exam and going through a thorough medical examination. After this, the Police administration then compiled a list of qualified applicants in readiness for publication and the issuance of invitation letters for the commencement of training."

The otherwise smooth recruitment exercise embarked upon by the Police administration took a nosedive when the government of President Akufo Addo suddenly ordered the former Inspector-General of Police, Mr. Asante Apeatu to suspend the recruitment exercise until further notice.

Subsequently, a new list other the than the list originally prepared by the Police administration was compiled and submitted by the government of President Akufo Addo to the police administration for the issuance of invitation letters for training.

The crux of the above narrative is that the recruitment exercise undertaken by the police administration in 2018 following the grant of financial clearance by the Finance Ministry was truncated at the tail end and taken over directly by the NPP government contrary to its own commitment to stamp out fraud and cronyism from the recruitment of personnel into the security agencies,” the stated revealed.

The statement also accuses the government of setting aside laid down procedures for recruitment into the Prisons and Immigration Services as well for the year 2019, adding that the Immigration and Prisons Services have secretly invited NPP cronies for screening and medical examination for possible recruitment.

The Minority has therefore called on the President to curb the alleged cronyism and nepotism in the recruitment to the security services.