Gifty Oware-Mensah
A High Court in Accra has ordered former Deputy Executive Director of the National Service Authority (NSA), Gifty Oware-Mensah, who is accused of stealing and causing financial loss of GH¢38.4 million to the state, to file the list of witnesses she will be calling if it becomes necessary.
The Office of the Attorney General has been given up to December 17, 2025 to file full disclosures and serve same on the accused person, after failing to meet the previous deadline of November 19, set by the court.
The court was expected to hold a case management conference yesterday and set a date for the commencement of the trial.
The court, however, had to adjourn the case as the Director of Public Prosecutions, Mrs. Yvonne Atakora Obuobisa told the court that they had some hitches in getting some of their witnesses to sign the statements.
She asked the court for a week to file the remaining disclosures and serve same on the accused person.
The trial judge, Justice Audrey Kocuvie-Tay, while adjourning the case to December 17, ordered the defence to file list of witnesses they may call when it becomes necessary at the close of the prosecution’s case.
Trial
Gifty Oware-Mensah has been dragged to court for allegedly causing financial loss of GH¢6,956,157.47 by causing the state to pay the said amount as interest to the Agricultural Development Bank (ADB) on a GH¢31,502,091.40 loan inappropriately authorised for Blocks of Life Consult, which she benefitted from.
She has also been accused of stealing and laundering GH¢31,502,091.40 by transferring it from the NSA higher-purchase escrow account with ADB to Blocks of Life Consult “for the purpose of disguising the illicit origin of the money, knowing it to be proceeds of crime.”
She pleaded not guilty to all the five charges read out by the court clerk and was granted a bail of GH¢10 million with three sureties, two of whom must be justified with landed property within Accra.
The sureties are to deposit a copy of their Ghana Card with the registrar while the accused was ordered to deposit her passport(s) with the registrar. She was also placed on the Stop List at all entry points of the country.
Brief Facts
The prosecution alleges that between February 2022 and March 2024, Gifty Oware-Mensah allegedly approached officials of ADB and informed them that the NSA had signed an agreement with her company, Blocks of Life Consult (BLC), to sell products on hire-purchase to national service personnel.
“She claimed that she required a loan of GH¢78,139,910.00 to support her business,” the facts said.
The accused, in October 2022, wrote to the bank and submitted a list of approximately 9,934 ghost names that she generated from the NSA Central Management System, claiming she had supplied goods on hire-purchase to the personnel and wanted to use their allowances as collateral for the facility.
ADB, however, told her that they could not approve the loan of GH¢78,139,910.00 as it would mean they would be deducting the full allowances of the supposed personnel.
She later agreed with the bank on the principal sum of GH¢31,502,091.40 and an interest of GH¢6,956,157.47 to be paid through source deductions of the 9,934 personnel allowance over 11 months.
An escrow account was established with ADB to retain the loan on behalf of the NSA, and the loan amount of GH¢31,502,091.40 was disbursed into the account.
It was subsequently transferred into Blocks of Life Consult on Gifty Oware’s instruction out of which she allegedly transferred GH¢22,925,518.69 to Amaecom Global Company, of which she was a director, and the remaining amount to three other companies.
BY Gibril Abdul Razak