Deputy Ranking Member on Parliament’s Communications Committee and MP for Ningo-Prampram, Sam Nartey George, has revealed that there are pre-registered SIM cards registered with Ghana Cards on the market.
According to him, the objective of the SIM re-registration exercise will not be realized if the current approach adopted by the Communications and Digitalization Minister, Ursula Owusu-Ekuful, is not changed.
Sam George stated that the existence of pre-registered SIM cards on the market indicates that the work done so far has not amounted to much.
“As we speak today, there are SIM cards that have been registered, out of the 21 million that have completed stage one and stage two. Some of those SIM cards have been registered by other people’s Ghana Card fictitiously. And as we speak today, there are pre-registered SIM cards registered with Ghana Card on the market. So what is the Minister solving?”.
Sam George
Mr George asserted that the registration of SIM cards does not in any way stop SIM fraud. Conversely, he insisted that it is “a fallacy of fact”.
The Ningo-Prampram legislator claimed that Mrs Ursula Owusu-Ekuful, in her haste to score “cheap political points”, has failed in the implementation of the policy.
“The Minister is on record to have said that people have registered more than 10 SIM cards to one Ghana Card. Is that not an admission of failure?… In her last but one public speech, she admitted and she was now warning people to go and unregister the SIM Cards.”
Sam George
It would be recalled that the Communication Ministry on Friday, November 11, 2022, announced that it will proceed to deactivate all unregistered SIM cards on the 30th of November 2022, after several postponements.
The Ministry in a statement stated that so far, only 70 percent of those who linked their SIM cards with their Ghana Cards have gone ahead to fully register, leaving some nine million SIM cards unregistered.
Registration of SIM cards with Ghana Card
Prior to this, Sam George revealed that Voter ID Cards will be accepted for the registration of SIM cards.
In a statement, he maintained that the Ministry of Communications and Digitalization has through the National Communications Authority engaged with the Telcos to adapt the platform to accommodate the Voter’s ID Card.
He equally noted that there are plans to integrate the Ghanaian Passport in line with the Minister’s earlier directive for Ghanaians abroad.
Responding to a statement from the NCA, Mr. George emphasized that “this incontrovertible fact is contained in their very own release”.
The NCA had earlier indicated that there’s been talks concerning the updating of the SIM registration App to allow temporary use of Voters IDs. It also highlighted that the development effort will take several weeks to complete, and discussions on the integration effort with network operators have not even been held.
The NCA noted further that similar efforts with Passport integration have taken more than three months and counting and are still not completed.
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