Mrs. Ursula Owusu, Minister of Communications and Digitalisation, on Sim registration has signaled to mete out sanctions for persons who are intentionally failing to register their SIM cards in the SIM Re-registration exercise.
This follows the expiration of the October deadline granted by the Ministry to get SIM users to re-register their SIM cards.
The Ministry announced in October that 28,959,006 SIM cards have been linked to Ghana Cards so far.
The number represented 67.28% of the 42,749,662 total SIM cards issued nationally.
Also, 18,930,664 SIM Cards had been fully registered, representing 44.28% of the total SIM cards issued.
The SIM card Re-registration exercise since its inception has not seen users in their numbers register their SIM unless in the final stages of the exercise, a trend which has been hugely criticized by the Ministry of Communications.
The Minister in response to this ‘behavioural pattern issued several warnings and further blocked temporarily some users as a way of compelling them to register their SIMs.
Section of the population, however, criticized the Ministry for poor performance on the exercise and unleashing inconveniences on Ghanaians as people had to queue for hours just to get their Ghana cards.
Others explained that the Minister could have easily ensured a seamless conduct of the exercise by simply engaging all stakeholders, especially the telcos, in feasibility studies prior to the exercise.
The Minority, also criticized the Minister for not having proper consultations prior to the exercise and after failing to meet her own deadlines, unleashed her frustrations on Ghanaians by blocking their SIMs.
Minister of Communications and Digitalisation, Mrs. Owusu-Ekuful, has explained that her ministry is in talks with the National Identification Authority (NIA) to address the complications faced by some registrants who have legitimate concerns.
The Minister disclosed these details when speaking at a Technology Breakfast Meeting to boost awareness of the government’s digitalization agenda among public sector chief executives where she urged Ghanaians to support the government’s quest to protect the digital space.
We all need to ensure that we protect the systems that we are putting in place. This is one aspect of it, but the SIM re-registration is also another aspect of it. There are some who have genuine concerns, and we are working with the NIA to [address them]. But there are others who have the Ghana cards but have not completed the process. So clearly, either they do not intend to, or are unwilling to, so we will have some measures to announce in due course soon, Ursula explained.
These ‘punitive’ measures hinted by the Minister may be the last strategy to compel Ghanaians to register their SIMs this time.
