Kissi Agyebeng is Ghana’s Special Prosecutor
The Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) has saved the national coffers GH¢5.7billion in the now cancelled Strategic Mobilisation Ghana Limited (SML) contract deal and seized assets in other corruption cases.
In a half-year report for the second half of 2025, the OSP commended President Mahama for cancelling the SML contract, acting on findings of the OSP.
The report however revealed that the cancellation saved the nation “false claims” which would have cost over GH¢5.7billion.
The investigation further revealed that the accused individuals including former Finance Minister Kenneth Ofori-Atta and former GRA commissioners sought to milk the nation of US$2.8billion.
However, the report maintained that the second half of 2025 marked a defining moment for the OSP – characterised by unprecedented political resistance which culminated in a petition and private member bill in parliament to abolish the OSP entirely and subsume it under the Attorney General’s Department.
The contract between SML, the Ministry of Finance and Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) was aimed at revenue assurance in the petroleum and minerals sectors.
However, the OSP maintains that investigations revealed that contractual arrangements were based on lies that SML possessed sophisticated technology for audit services.
“There was no genuine need,” Special Prosecutor Kissi Agyebeng stated in the report. It further revealed that the OSP found that the contracts were “attended by egregious statutory breaches”, with mandatory approvals disregarded.
The OSP announced its conclusion of investigations in the SML case in the report, with February 26, 2026 set for the long-awaited trial to kick off.
However, former Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta a party to the case, who has been declared a fugitive twice is still in ICE detention in the US pending trial and then execution of OSP’s extradition request.
The report detailed the cat-and-mouse game the former minister played with officials; from requests for medical travel and missing deadlines and later travelling to London, observed by OSP sources who found him “physically and psychologically healthy” and then getting a last-minute cancer diagnosis just days before a scheduled interview.
While battling these, the report revealed that during this period a private member’s bill was introduced in parliament aiming to abolish the OSP and subsume its functions under the Attorney General, saying the Office was a “drain on national resources”.
The report maintains that the OSP saved the state twenty times the total funds released to it since its inception.
“If the clearly contrived yardstick is measured against actual performance of every investigative institution, none would survive abolishment,” it stated.
The OSP revealed that it has also seized over GH¢100million in assets – including fuel stations, luxury apartments in East Legon and Airport Residential Area and prime land – linked to the former NPA CEO Mustapha Abdul-Hamid in an ongoing case against him and nine others.
He also revealed that a pilot of the joint OSP-Controller and Accountant General’s Department (CAGD) operation against “ghost names” on the government payroll in Northern Region blocked GH¢2.85million of monthly unearned salaries.
The OSP flagged the Ghana Health Service’s exclusive disinfection deal with LCB Worldwide at ports as an “immense systemic corruption risk”, demanding suspension and audit.
According to the report, this prevented an estimated GH¢345million of potential losses.
“The fight against corruption will be carried out much more effectively and won if the OSP is spared constant and needless existential battles,” Agyebeng stated with frustration in the report – endorsing the Constitution Review Committee’s call for the OSP to be entrenched in the constitution as an independent anti-corruption commission and resourced well.
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Source:
www.ghanaweb.com