Why should students be made to pay to activate their NSS enrollment? — Sulemana Briamah quizzes

There have been criticisms against prospective National Service personnel usually paying fees to activate their enrollment for compulsory national service.

The issue arises as the National Service Scheme (NSS) released PIN codes for over 133,476 final year students and qualified Ghanaians to enroll for the 2024/2025 service year.

As part of the enrollment process, prospective service personnel are required to pay GHC40 at ADB banks or GHC41 via MTN Mobile Money to validate their registration.

However, Sulemana Braimah, Executive Director of the Media Foundation for West Africa, has raised concerns about the fees.

In a social media post on Tuesday, June 19, Mr. Braimah argues that as national service is a compulsory civic duty for Ghanaian graduates, prospective personnel should not be paying to enroll and take up their postings.

He believes the fees charged by NSS amount to an unnecessary financial burden on new graduates.

“Why should students who will be offering service to the nation be made to pay to activate their enrollment. Just so that NSS will make a cool GHC5.3million without sweat?" read his post on X.

Meanwhile, thousands of final-year students are in the process of registering with NSS for the upcoming mandatory one-year national service starting later this year.