The Minister-Designate for Communications, Digital Technology, and Innovation, Sam Nartey George, has announced plans to implement a new SIM card registration process to address issues encountered during the previous exercise.
In 2022, the previous government conducted a SIM card re-registration, requiring cardholders to visit various MNOs’ offices to link their SIM cards with their Ghana Cards. Failure to comply led to SIM card blockages or the withdrawal of essential services.
During his vetting by Parliament’s Appointments Committee, George criticized the previous government’s approach, particularly the long queues and inefficiencies faced by Ghanaians during the registration process.
He assured the committee that, under his leadership, the new SIM registration exercise would be more efficient and streamlined, leveraging technology to cross-reference data with the National Identification Authority (NIA) database. This approach would eliminate the need for long queues and simplify the process for Ghanaians.
“The actions that happened under the last government were very at par with common sense and logic. We have a National Identification Authority that holds and sits as our national repository of biometric data. I think it was wickedness to the highest order to subject Ghanaians to long hours of queue, taking away productive man hours and affecting our economy to go and queue again and resubmit biometrics simply because egos could not be managed.
“We will do a proper sim re-registration exercise again but this time, nobody is going to queue. Because common sense will prevail, expertise will prevail and logic will work.
“The MNOs hold a certain set of dates. We will use technology to cross-reference that against the NIA’s database and all biometric databases and only instances where there is a disparity would require you to visit an MNO shop.
“Because today, as we speak, the telcos cannot truly verify who is holding their sim car. It is even in their own benefit for us to do this process and do it properly,” he stated.
