Ghana’s leading
telecommunication group, MTN Ghana, has called on
the general public to aid in the prevention of fibre cuts across the country.
According to
the chief executive officer of MTN Ghana, Selorm Adadevoh, the group has
recorded over 900 fibre cuts between January and May 2022 across the country.
The phenomenon, he lamented,
has over the years affected the provision and rapid expansion of its network as
“we are spending too much money fixing the things that we have already spent
money on.”
Adadevoh further called for
more education and attention to be drawn to the menace.
“When they cut the fibre and
you take your phone and you’re about to make a call, the network is down, and
you’ll complain about MTN’s network, but that’s not the problem,” he said. “The problem is, we are not looking
after the assets of telecommunication companies to make sure that the network
can be strong unless we deploy a military force to look after our fibre, but
that is not possible. “
“So we need us as Ghanaians to
support us. That is all we need. We need the media to support us. To let people
understand that when you’re building a new house and you see some cables, you
don’t just cut them to build your wall,” he said at the 2022 editors and
stakeholders’ forum in Kumasi, in the Ashanti Region.
The Ashanti Region, according
to the Ghana Chamber of Telecommunications, recorded 43.5% of cable and
cell-site-equipment theft in the Ashanti Region, with the Greater Accra Region
recording 15.7% of total theft cases recorded across the country.
The CEO further hinted at plans
by the telecommunication giant to extend its 4G network to all 260 districts
across the country by the end of 2022.
SIM card re-registration
On the issue of the SIM card
re-registration exercise, Selorm Adadevoh revealed that about 16.8 million
customers, representing 60% of their customers, have linked their Ghana cards,
with only 10.8 million of them, representing 40%, biometrically capturing their
data.
He said MTN is in talks with
relevant stakeholders to facilitate the distribution of the Ghana cards to
allow more users to partake in the exercise.
“There’s a challenge with how many of our customers have the
National ID card.” And that’s an area we’re looking at; how we can support the
NIA to make sure customers can get the cards to do the registration. We’re
doing some partnerships with the NIA so that those who don’t have the ID cards,
especially those in remote areas, can get the cards so we can facilitate the
process for them”
Ghanaians have till 31 July
2022 to re-register their SIM cards with their respective network providers.
The Minister of Communication
and Digitalization has emphasised that the Ministry would not extend the set
deadline for the nationwide SIM card registration exercise.
Loretta Timah
Source: Asaaseradio