OVER 6,000 SECURITY SERVICE APPLICANTS FAIL DRUG TEST AFTER TESTING POSITIVE FOR ILLICIT DRUGS

More than 6,000 applicants seeking recruitment into the country’s security services were found to have used illicit drugs when they were subjected to mandatory drug screening for the first time this year.

The Director-General of the Narcotics Control Commission (NACOC), Brigadier General Maxwell Obuba Mantey, disclosed that the applicants, representing about seven per cent of all candidates screened for recruitment into the Ghana Police Service, Ghana Prisons Service, Ghana National Fire Service and the Ghana Ambulance Service, tested positive for substances such as cannabis, cocaine, methamphetamine, opiates and tramadol

Brig. Gen. Mantey said the outcome called for sustained preventive interventions to protect the youth from substance abuse.

“If we cannot secure the people who guard our streets, how do we secure the country?

This is not a cause for despair. It is a call for urgent, systematic action,” he said.

Brig. Gen. Mantey said this at the national commemoration of the International Day Against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking held in Accra last Friday, June 26, on the theme: “The World Drug Problem: Persisting Issues, New Challenges, Innovative Responses”.

Brig. Gen. Mantey said the 2025 World Drug Report estimated that about 316 million people globally used illicit drugs, while the illicit drug trade generated hundreds of billions of dollars annually for organised criminal networks.

He said criminal organisations continued to develop new methods of manufacturing and trafficking drugs through new routes, encrypted digital platforms and sophisticated concealment methods, adding that Ghana had recently uncovered methamphetamine concealed in bags of charcoal.

He said Ghana was increasingly being confronted with synthetic drugs and new psychoactive substances that were more potent, more addictive and harder to detect, while traffickers continued to exploit digital technology, encrypted communications and commercial trade routes.

He explained that between 2025 and April this year, NACOC had recorded 2,217 arrests and 165 prosecutions, while more than 8.5 tonnes of narcotic drugs had been seized.

He added that the commission had confiscated 45.4 million tramadol tablets between 2025 and this year, saying the quantity was enough opioid doses to medicate every Ghanaian once and over.

The Director-General further stated that the country had evolved from being merely a transit point for illicit drugs to becoming a destination for their distribution and consumption, saying the trend required stronger and smarter responses.