Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana Chamber of Telecommunications, Dr. Ken Ashigbey, has disclosed that the National Communication Authority (NCA) has been in consultation with mobile operators in the country in a bid to address challenges posed by the ongoing SIM card re-registration exercise.

According to him, the Chamber has realized the difficulties encountered with the SIM re-registration exercise nationwide.

His comments follow agitations among some section of the public who experienced challenges registering their SIM cards.

“… There was a meeting between the NCA and the operators; all looking at the challenges that are coming up and figuring out ways in which we’ll be able to better improve the system that we currently have”.
Dr. Ken Ashigbey

Public agitate over challenges with SIM registration

Apart from long queues at various registration centers, some customers had to deal with some technical challenges from some network operators.

Touching on this, Mr Ashigbey emphasized that based on an assessment of the events at the various centers and the feedback from the grounds, measures will be put in place to overcome the hurdles.

“At the end of the day, the assessment is based on what we’re seeing. So, once you see these long queues at the various centers, some of which have even resulted in some of our members having to close some of their centers, it has resulted in some COVID-19 cases in some centers and all of that, that definitely is worrying”.
Dr. Ken Ashigbey

Nonetheless, Mr Ashigbey indicated that the good thing about it is that, it has been a system that the Chamber has constantly been monitoring and doing a lot of improvement on.

Elaborating on the frustration encountered by registrants, with some threatening to abandon the process altogether, Mr Ashigbey expressed that as technicians and stakeholders, they are considering smoother means to ease the growing inconveniences.

“The self-service that we’re doing at the first stage, we should be able to design a system again that enables some people to do some self-service, even with the biometric capture. Because, if you have a system in which I can put my finger on a particular device and then be able to link that device to the NIA data base, such that if there’s a match, then that feedback comes, that will be something that would help”.
Dr. Ken Ashigbey

Mr Ashigbey intimated that such a move will eliminate individuals who can do it themselves. This, he noted, can reduce the numbers.

“So, I’m hoping that as we continue to engage, we should be able to design a system that enables that to happen. If that happens, it will definitely cut the number of people and improve the user experience that currently characterizes what it is that we’re dealing with at this stage”.
Dr. Ken Ashigbey

In its effort to avert cyber security issues and create an operational national data base for citizens, the National Communication Authority, in collaboration with the National Identification Authority (NIA) are embarking on a nationwide SIM reregistration for all mobile phone users.

For persons who fail to register their SIM, the NCA has revealed, will have their SIM cards blocked at the end of the nationwide exercise in March, 2022.