Mayor Rob Ford suffered a sixth staff resignation in eight days, albeit one apparently in the works before the crack video scandal unleashed a high-profile firing and a wave of resignations in his office.

Michael Prempeh, one of the two young “special assistants” who came to Ford’s office via the University of Toronto’s football program, resigned on Friday, a city spokeswoman confirmed.

Sources say he told Ford and his colleagues weeks ago that he planned to leave to focus on marketing and promotions duties at CAVE magazine.

Ford moved swiftly to counter talk that his office is in chaos by announcing Friday that he has hired three “movers and shakers” and expects to announce another three or four hires early next week.

One of the new staffers is special assistant Katrina Xavier-Ponniah. The junior position pays in the $40,000 range.

Xavier-Ponniah’s Linkedin profile says she studied at Mount Allison University in Sackville, N.B. Work experience includes summer stints of administrative work for a lawyer and data entry for the university.

The exodus from Ford’s office started with Mark Towhey, Ford’s chief of staff, right-hand man and tireless defender who was fired and marched out of city hall by security.

Sources say Towhey had urged the mayor to take steps to get healthy.

Then on Monday both of Ford’s spokespeople, George Christopolous and Isaac Ransom, abruptly resigned.

They were followed on Thursday by Brian Johnston, a policy adviser and council relations official, and Kia Nejatian, Ford’s executive assistant.

Ford, who has said things are going “great” and it is business as usual for his office, told reporters Friday that he had just hired two new staff.

“Yeah, good people,” he said, before giving two young women separate tours of the mayor’s administrative office, nicknamed “the fishbowl” for its glass walls, which has been the site of staff departure dramas.

A relaxed-looking Ford paused to show one of the women a fish tank in the corner.

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Publicly, Ford has called reports that he appears on a video smoking crack cocaine as “ridiculous” and said “there’s no video.”

However, Ford has refused to discuss the reports in detail, fuelling concerns from councillors that the scandal and sordid headlines are damaging the city and prompting two of them to say he should step aside temporarily.