The Ghanaian Immigration Service (GIS) has disqualified candidates with bleached skin and stretch marks from a massive recruitment exercise.

A GIS spokesman told the BBC this was because people with such marks might bleed during the "strenuous" training.

Some Ghanaians condemned the bar as sexist and unfair. Those with tattoos, dreadlocks and "bow legs" were also disqualified from the exercise.

The GIS received some 84,000 applications for just 500 jobs.

"The kind of work we do, it's strenuous and the training is such that if you have bleached skin or surgical marks on your body during training exercises, you may incur some bleedings," Superintendent Michael Amoako-Attah, told BBC Pidgin.

Candidates must undergo a medical and a full body check as part of the GIS recruitment process.

It is the ban on stretch marks which has aroused most anger on social media.


BBC