Story: News Desk

The Narcotics Control Commission (NACOC) has revealed that over 6,000 applicants who failed mandatory drug screening during this year’s recruitment into Ghana’s security services tested positive for five major illicit drugs, including cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamine. 

Deputy Director-General of NACOC, Alexander Twum-Barimah, disclosed the details during an interview with  the media in  Accra  on Thursday, July 30, 2026, while discussing Ghana’s growing drug challenge. 

According to him, the applicants who failed the screening were not using just one type of illicit substance but tested positive for a range of drugs. 

“They didn’t just fail one common drug. They failed to five main ones,” Mr Twum-Barimah said. 

He listed the substances as cocaine, heroin, cannabis, opioids and methamphetamine. 

“One, cocaine; two, heroin; three, cannabis; four, opioids; and meth. These were the five main ones,” he stated. 

Earlier this year, NACOC disclosed that more than 6,000 out of over 100,000 applicants screened for recruitment into the security services had failed mandatory drug tests. However, the Commission had not publicly identified the specific drugs detected until now. 

Speaking on the origin of the substances, Mr Twum-Barimah said cocaine and heroin were not produced in Ghana, but somehow found its way into the country. 

“Cocaine is not made in Ghana. Heroin is not made in Ghana. Cannabis, I mean that one is Ghana’s own,” he said 

On methamphetamine, he indicated that there was  currently no confirmed evidence of local production, although investigations have linked Ghana to international trafficking operations. 

“I’m not sure we cook meth in Ghana. We’ve not gotten to the case where we can say there is evidence that we found this here,” he said. 

“But at least we have a case, the Australian one, where we’ve gotten to know where the loads or the items were loaded,” he added.