Phone owners without Ghana card have not been blocked – Ursula

The Minister of Communications, Ursula Owusu-Ekuful has denied reports that mobile subscribers without a Ghana Card which is the main document for the registration of SIM cards have had their numbers deactivated.

Telecommunication Networks have since Thursday, December 1, been applying sanctions to unregistered subscribers, including the deactivation of SIM cards that have successfully passed the first phase of registration but are yet to complete the second stage.

There are, however, reports that subscribers without Ghana cards to complete the registration process have also had their SIM cards deactivated.

But responding to some of these concerns raised by the ranking member of the Communication committee of Parliament, the Minister said these reports are inaccurate.

“People who did not have Ghana Cards have had their cards blocked, and I said No, that has not happened. It is those who have completed the first phase of the exercise by linking their cards to the SIM cards but had not gone on to do the biometric capture that has had their Ghana Cards blocked.”

Meanwhile, police officers have been deployed to some SIM registration centers in the Ashanti Regional capital, Kumasi to avert possible chaos, after hundreds of customers whose SIM cards have been blocked thronged the various centers.

There is growing frustration among affected customers at the various centers who say they cannot access major services on their mobile phones like calls, data and mobile money transactions after their SIM cards were deactivated.

The customers claim that despite going through the re-registration successfully, they have had their SIM cards deactivated.