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The Office of the Auditor-General has recovered GH¢10 million from persons who were paid salaries they did not deserve.
The office has remitted the amount into the Consolidated Fund at the Bank of Ghana.
The amount was paid voluntarily by the individuals implicated in an ongoing special audit into unearned salaries, a phenomenon that has been a major drain on the public purse.
In an exclusive interview with the Daily Graphic, the Auditor-General, Johnson Akuamoah Asiedu, disclosed that the recoveries were made within the last two months alone, as the audit exercise, which was still in progress, gathered momentum.
So far, the audit shows that 53,311 government workers who had officially left the public service remained on the payroll, leading to the payment of over GH¢150 million in unearned salaries.“The audit is still ongoing, but we have already seen significant results. Within the last two months, we have recovered GH¢10 million, which has been duly paid into the Consolidated Fund.
This money represents amounts voluntarily refunded by individuals who were flagged for receiving salaries they were not entitled to,” Mr Asiedu stated.
The report, covering between 2023 and April this year, exposes a catastrophic breakdown in the payroll management system across Ministries, Departments, Agencies (MDAs), and Metropolitan, Municipal, and District Assemblies (MMDAs), raising serious questions about financial controls and accountability.
The Auditor-General's data indicates that while the government's system recorded the separation of 53,311 staff for reasons including termination, end of contract, resignation, and even death, the crucial information was not transmitted to the Controller and Accountant-General's Department (CAGD) to stop their salaries.
Out of the 53,311 separated staff, 2,446 were inexplicably paid salaries after their official exit dates.
The payments labelled as "unearned salaries" sum up to GH¢150.36 million, which the report notes are now subject to "expected recovery".
The report sternly points out that the 53,311 individuals "are not expected to be present for Head Count," confirming they were essentially "ghost workers" for the period after their separation but before their names were finally removed from the payroll.
The Office of the Auditor-General has flagged the GH¢150 million for recovery, demanding that the respective MDAs and MMDAs urgently retrieve the funds from the recipients.
Mr Asiedu expressed satisfaction with the pace of voluntary repayments, stating it was a positive development in the fight against corruption and financial malfeasance.
He explained that the proactive approach of his office, which involved notifying the individuals of the discrepancies, had prompted the refunds.
This, he said, saved the state the time and resources that would have been spent on a prolonged legal battle to recover the funds.
While commending those who had chosen to refund the monies, the Auditor-General issued a stern warning to the public officials whose actions or inaction facilitated the illegal payments.
He revealed that his office was now working closely with the Ministry of Finance and the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of the Ghana Police Service to investigate and prosecute the public officials who authorised and validated the fraudulent payments in the first place.
“Recovering the money is one thing, but ensuring accountability and preventing a recurrence is another. We are not stopping at the recovery. My office is collaborating with the CID to identify and go after the persons who validated these unearned salaries,” he emphasised.
“These are the payroll officers, the controllers, the human resource personnel, and the heads of institutions who either negligently or complicitly allowed this to happen. Their actions constitute a serious crime against the state,” Mr Asiedu added.
He stated that dossiers on these officials were being prepared and would be handed over to the police for thorough investigation and possible prosecution.
The special audit into unearned salaries is part of the Auditor-General’s broader mandate to cleanse the government payroll of ghost names and other irregularities.
Mr Asiedu assured the public that the exercise would be sustained until every government agency was audited and all culpable individuals were held accountable.
He urged other persons who might have benefited from such fraudulent schemes to voluntarily step forward and refund the money to avoid the full rigours of the law when they are eventually caught.
President John Dramani Mahama, at his first media encounter at the Jubilee House last Wednesday night, disclosed that the Office of the Attorney-General was working with the Judicial Service to set up special courts to fast-track action on reports of the Auditor-General.
He said such courts would ensure the timely prosecution of individuals who abused the public purse and help recover stolen money.
The Minister of Finance, Dr Cassiel Ato Forson, first revealed that there were about 53,000 ghost names on the government’s payroll during his presentation of the 2025 Mid-Year Budget Review on July 24, 2025.
At the time, he stated that the audit was still ongoing and indicated that a recovery of unearned salary from these persons was estimated to be over GH¢150 million.
"Mr Speaker, the Ghana Audit Service has completed 91 per cent of the payroll audit.
So far, the Audit Service has not been able to identify and verify over 14,000 workers.
Again, they have identified 53,311 separated staff — staff who are either on retirement, resigned, terminated, leave without pay or deceased, and yet remain on government payroll," he said.
"The Audit Service expects to recover GH¢150.4 million of unearned salaries from the separated staff over the 2023 and 2024 period," he added.
The issue of unearned salaries and ghost names has been a persistent finding in the Auditor-General's reports for decades.
Previous audits, including the 2022 Auditor-General's Report submitted to Parliament, similarly flagged millions of Ghana cedis paid to staff who were no longer in service, repeatedly citing a failure by MDAs to promptly notify the Controller and Accountant-General's Department of staff separations.
In response to the recurring findings, the government has initiated several payroll cleansing exercises.
The most significant of them is the implementation of the Integrated Personnel and Payroll Database (IPPD2), designed to centralise and automate payroll management to eliminate such discrepancies.
In spite of these efforts, the current report indicates that systemic weaknesses and delays in communication between government departments remain a significant challenge.
