President John Dramani Mahama has pushed back against suggestions that Ghana’s recent security services recruitment exercise was manipulated, insisting the digital application process was deliberately designed to take human judgment and human interference out of the equation entirely.
Speaking during a question and answer session at a dialogue with the Ghanaian community in Philadelphia on Thursday, President Mahama said the online system was put in place precisely because of longstanding complaints that recruitment into the security services had historically been driven by connections rather than qualifications.
“The intent was actually in good faith, When you go online and apply and fill all the fields with your qualification and everything, the computer doesn’t know who you are,” he told the gathering.
He explained that once applications were submitted, an algorithm processed them against set criteria, age, qualifications and other requirements, with no room for human intervention.
Applicants’ Ghana Card numbers fed their ages directly into the system, meaning those outside the required age range were disqualified automatically. Those who did not meet other criteria faced the same outcome.
But the scale of the response exposed a different problem entirely. Two hundred and eighty thousand young Ghanaians applied for what was initially a 5,000-slot intake, each paying more than GH₵200 for the chance , money many had borrowed from parents or friends.
When the algorithm returned disqualification notices, the fees were not returned.
“Young students who have finished school looking for a job had to go and borrow 200 cedis or take it from their parents to pay to get a chance to be recruited, and a computer just says disqualified. Meanwhile, their 200 cedis is gone,” President Mahama said.
He said the government convened an emergency meeting and decided to expand the intake to 10,000 recruits per year over four years, bringing the total to 40,000. All 280,000 who had already applied and paid would not be required to reapply or pay again, the existing database would be used for all future selection rounds.
President Mahama said the episode pointed to a problem far bigger than the recruitment process. Ghana’s economy, he said, had stagnated for years and was not generating enough jobs for its young population, a reality the government’s reset agenda, infrastructure push and macroeconomic stabilisation programme were all designed to address.
Richard Aniagyei, ISD
