The National Identification Authority (NIA) has indicated that it will not be able to provide Ghana Cards to all eligible Ghanaians with less than two weeks till the deadline for the SIM card re-registration.

Over two million Ghanaians have yet to register for the Card, which is the only paperwork for registration, despite the Communications Ministry’s warnings to deactivate all unregistered SIM Cards after the September 30 deadline.

At a press conference on Friday, NIA Executive Director Ken Attafuah emphasized that the Authority’s financial and logistical mechanisms were not built to handle such urgent missions.

“We have the mandate to register all Ghanaians in Ghana and all Ghanaians abroad. There is no way NIA can register all Ghanaians in Ghana. If you look at our performance record, as stern as we believe our performance is, the reality is that there are approximately two million people aged 15 and above who have not registered for the Ghana Card.

“Today is the 16th of September; there is no way that NIA can register those people. It is physically, technically and fiscally impossible. What advice flows from that?

“We had said way back in March that it was impossible and it’s like expecting a maiden to make a baby every three months – so, that’s not how the law designed NIA,” he argued.

After many Ghanaians found it difficult to go through the process of having their Ghana Cards become unavailable, the SIM card re-registration activity was postponed till September 30, 2022.

“Upon consultation with the industry and in view of the challenges enumerated above, I have very reluctantly decided to grant a conditional extension. The programme will be extended to 30th September to end on the anniversary of its commencement,” the Minister of Communications, Ursula Owusu-Ekuful, announced.

The National Communication Authority (NCA) then partially blocked SIM cards that had not been re-registered as of September 5; this decision was eventually overturned in response to a public outcry.

Selorm Branttie, a policy analyst, claims that barring unregistered SIM cards beyond September 30 can only result in the failure of the government’s digitalization plan. The deadline is quickly approaching.

“You are talking about flirting and toying, making a petri-dish of the whole digitization agenda which is being run by the Vice President himself, and by so many different organisations, you are talking about flirting with our SDGs.

“You are talking about blocking digital access, you are talking about creating a digital apartheid where people are being made to pay for another organisation not fulfilling their obligation,” he stated on Joy FM’s Super Morning Show on September 13, 2022.

According to Mr. Branttie’s worry, it would be unwise to enforce the September 30 deadline if many users still do not have the Ghana Card.

He predicted that if the Minister persists in her position, the results will be chaos. Therefore, he challenged Mrs. Owusu-Ekuful to carry out her threat and block unregistered SIM cards.

“I double dare the Minister to go by her own words and see the kind of chaos that will happen in this country.

“I am saying chaos because you are talking about flirting with the fortunes of the service sector which contributes more than 45% of our GDP,” the policy analyst stated.

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