The National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO) in Ghana has initiated a volunteer recruitment drive across all districts to enhance community-level disaster preparedness and response. The programme aims to recruit 40 volunteers per constituency, with districts having multiple constituencies recruiting proportionally more. This move is part of NADMO's effort to build local resilience capacity and empower citizens to take the lead in disaster preparedness and response.
The volunteer recruitment drive is not a paid recruitment exercise, but rather a service opportunity for individuals to support disaster response in their communities. Volunteers will be trained and equipped with basic emergency response skills, including firefighting, and will focus on water rescue, particularly swimming and diving, due to frequent drowning incidents in riverine communities. The training is practical and will be completed before the end of the first quarter of 2026.
NADMO's volunteer structures include Community-Based Volunteer Groups, Institutional Volunteer Clubs in schools and religious institutions, and Agency and Civil Society Volunteers. The organisation's Deputy Director-General in charge of Community Empowerment and Sustainable Livelihood, Albert Akuka Alalzuuga, emphasised that the initiative is more than a programme, but a movement that places NADMO in every home, school, and community.
The volunteer drive is part of the government's broader disaster management framework, which emphasises community-level preparedness and risk reduction. The National Disaster Management and Risk Finance Strategy Framework for 2025–2030 supports this direction. Ghana faces recurring hazards, including flooding in Accra and other urban areas, drowning in riverine communities, fire outbreaks, and other emergencies.
NADMO is also part of the Ministry of the Interior's centralised electronic recruitment portal for security and public safety agencies, alongside the Police, Prisons, Fire, Immigration, and the Narcotics Control Commission. The portal was launched in November 2025 to streamline hiring across security and public safety agencies and ensure fairness, efficiency, and equal opportunity for qualified applicants nationwide.
For individuals seeking formal, paid employment with NADMO, the centralised portal is the channel to monitor. When vacancies are announced, applications will be processed through the centralised system rather than through NADMO's own website. NADMO's organisational website is www.nadmo.gov.gh, but formal recruitment applications for security-sector agencies are processed through the centralised portal.
The initiative has addressed a specific gap in NADMO's capacity to respond to drowning incidents, with only one diver in the entire Upper East Region at the time of the announcement. Training local volunteers in swimming and diving creates a distributed network of responders who can act before national teams arrive.
Key points
- The volunteer recruitment drive targets 40 volunteers per constituency.
- Volunteers will receive training in basic emergency response skills, including firefighting and water rescue.
- Formal employment with NADMO will be processed through the Ministry of the Interior's centralised e-recruitment portal.
