OSP to file criminal charges against high-ranking officials of NPA over an alleged corrupt scheme involving over GH¢280 million
The Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) is to file criminal charges against some high-ranking officials of the National Petroleum Authority (NPA) before the end of June over an alleged corrupt scheme involving over GH¢280 million.
This is said to have happened between 2022 and 2024.
In February 2025, the OSP announced that it had launched an investigation into the former Chief Executive of the National Petroleum Authority (NPA), Mustapha Abdul-Hamid, over his alleged involvement in the embezzlement of GH₵1.3 billion from the Unified Petroleum Pricing Fund (UPPF).
The OSP said the investigation was primarily targeting Mustapha Abdul-Hamid alongside three other NPA officials: Jacob Amuah, UPPF Coordinator, Freda Tandoh, NPA staff and Wendy Ashong Newman, NPA staff.
Read also: Former NPA CEO Mustapha Abdul-Hamid under investigation by Special Prosecutor
Three months after that announcement, the Special Prosecutor, Kissi Agyebeng at a press conference on Monday evening [June 2, 2025] indicated that criminal charges were going to be filed against four high ranking officials of the NPA.
He, however, did not mention names and explained that in November 2024, the OSP commenced investigations into suspected corruption and corruption related offences in respect of the operations of National Petroleum Authority (NPA) and the activities of some of its officials.
According to him the OSP's investigation has revealed that between 2022 and 2024, some high ranking and other officials of NPA devised and implemented a corrupt scheme of using public office for profit – through threats, intimidation, coercion, suggestions, bribery, and inordinate regulatory duress – to obtain, for their personal benefit, large sums of money from oil marketing companies and other entities under their statutory regulatory, licensing, oversight, and monitoring mandate in the petroleum downstream industry.
Mr Kissi Agyebeng indicated that as of the close of day on May 30, 2025, the OSP had uncovered, through tracing and trailing, of an amount of GH¢280,516,127.19 being proceeds of the corrupt scheme, some of which has been used by the perpetrators to acquire identified and traced apartments, suites, houses in-country and abroad, twenty-two fuel haulage trucks, and the incorporation, acquisition, and operation of oil marketing companies to compete with the oil marketing companies they were regulating.
He said the OSP, before the end of June, would file criminal charges against the first batch of the perpetrators and complicit oil marketing companies and their officials.
He said upon filing, "we would brief you [public] in detail in respect of who did what, who acquired what, and what has been recovered.
Writer's email: enoch.frimpong@graphic.com.gh
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