Government has been asked to review the National Service Scheme to make it more useful to both the government and service personnel. A management consultant, Mr. Ato Conduah, told Joy News the annual challenges with the scheme that leaves service personnel frustrated should not be ignored, but should rather form the basis for its revision. This year’s computerized selection has been frought with several problems with most service personnel complaining that the posting did not match the choices they made. “Like any institution, after its inception stage into the growth stage, there are changes that ought to be made to accommodate the challenges that come,” Mr. Conduah remarked. He is therefore called on the administrators of the scheme to take a second look at the placement system, which has deprived service personnel the joy of being placed at right places and the scheme’s inability to ensure easy registration. Mr. Conduah, however, implored service personnel not to view the need to offer their services to the nation as a punishment. “We often view national service as a form of punishment. What we need to view the national service is, one, an opportunity to get a real character training, which otherwise you would never have had; two, an opportunity to work in a community outside where you have grown up or lived; and three the opportunity for every citizen who has gone through the educational system to at least get the opportunity to volunteer his or her services to the state.” He entreated the National Service Secretariat and the government to have a look at “where we can invest more to improve the process so that people do not see it as a problematic area that frustrates them from serving their country”. About 34,500 personnel were posted to various organisations across the country for 2008/2009 with 70 per cent of them being in the education sector. As usual, the Greater Accra Region topped the list of postings with 10,988 service personnel, followed by the Ashanti Region , 5,640 personnel, Brong Ahafo, 2,667, Central region, 2,080, Eastern, 2,871, Western, 2,690 and Volta 1,571. The Northern, Upper West and Upper East would also receive 1,871; 710 and 698 personnel respectively. Story by Isaac Essel