The Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) has charged seven (7) individuals and one company before the Criminal Division of an Accra High Court with 78 counts of corruption and corruption related offences over the SML scandal.
The accused persons are:
- Kenneth Nana Yaw Ofori-Atta (A1), former Minister of Finance
- Ernest Darko Akore (A2), Chef de Cabinet to Ofori-Atta
- Emmanuel Kofi Nti (A3), former Commissioner-General of Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA)
- Rev. Dr. Ammishaddai Owusu-Amoah (A4), former Commissioner-General of GRA
- Isaac Crentsil (A5), former Commissioner of Customs Division of GRA
- Kwadwo Damoah (A6), MP for Jaman South and former Commissioner of Customs Division of GRA
- Evans Adusei (A7), beneficial owner and Chief Executive of Strategic Mobilization Ghana Limited and
- Strategic Mobilization Ghana Limited (SML) – (A8).
Per the charge sheet, dated November 18, 2025, the accused persons conspired to set up and did perform acts in furtherance of the conspiracy to set up a criminal enterprise of directly and indirectly influencing the procurement process to obtain unfair advantage for SML (A8) in the award of procurement contracts for transaction audit services, external price verification services, measurement audit of downstream petroleum products, upstream petroleum audit services, and minerals audit services purportedly by the Government of Ghana, acting through the Ministry of Finance and Ghana Revenue Authority.
The criminal enterprise was commenced in 2017 by Kenneth Ofori-Atta (A1), Emmanuel Kofi Nti (A3), Evans Adusei (A7), and SML (A8), with the other accused persons joining the adventure at various times.
The criminal enterprise was characterised by no genuine need for contracting SML for the obligations it purported to perform, and the contracts were secured for SML through self-serving patronage, sponsorship, and promotion by the Kenneth Ofori-Atta, Ernest Darko Akore (A2), Emmanuel Kofi Nti, Ammishaddai Owusu-Amoah, Isaac Crentsil, and Kwadwo Damoah based on false and unverified claims.
Also, the contracts were attended by the commission of egregious prohibited acts as mandatory statutory prior approvals by Parliament, and the Procurement Authority were wantonly disregarded by Kenneth Ofori-Atta, Emmanuel Kofi Nti, Ammishaddai Owusu-Amoah, Isaac Crentsil, and Kwadwo Damoah who acted with increased emboldened impunity as they freely abused their public offices by using the offices for private benefit.
Further, the five state officials ensured that there was no established financial management system of monitoring and verification to assure that the Republic was obtaining the value for the money it was paying to SML, and the channels of payments of public funds to SML were set on automatic mode by the five detached from actual performance and based on false and unverified claims in wilful oppressive injury to the public.
The actions of the five, led by Kenneth Ofori-Atta created the opportunity for SML to largely pretend to perform the services under the various contracts – leading to immense financial loss to the Republic of about GHC1.44 billion.
The charge sheet stated that, had they not been halted by the actions of three petitioners who lodged a complaint with the OSP in December 2023 against the criminal enterprise; corruption and corruption-related investigations conducted by the OSP between 20 December 2023 and 3 October 2025; Government intervention of temporarily suspending performance of the purported services in early January 2024; and a directive by the President of the Republic on 31 October 2025 for the termination of all the public contracts awarded to SML by the Ministry of Finance and GRA – the accused persons also intended that a further estimated US$2.8 billion be paid to SML for a period of five (5) years without the mandatory statutory prior authorisation by Parliament.
The accused persons based their actions on their false claims that SML possessed technical expertise and capability in revenue assurance, and that the technical expertise and capability of SML had greatly increased revenue for the Republic; and further that SML exclusively possessed the only patented and proven technology systems in the world for value chain transaction audits, external price verification, and measurement audit services in the downstream petroleum, upstream petroleum, and minerals sectors.
Find the full charge sheet below:
