No one should be deprived of telephony services – Ursula

The Minister of Communications, Mrs Ursula Owusu-Ekuful, has said the government is deploying a nation-wide dedicated telecommunication network to connect all governmental agencies to ensure transparency in the country’s financial administration.

The minister disclosed this at the launch of a Rural Telephony Project at New Edubiase in the Ashanti Region on Wednesday, November 4, 2020.

Emphasising the use of electronic communications as a catalyst for sustainable socio-economic development, Mrs Owusu-Ekuful reiterated President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo's goal of achieving a digitised economy by providing access to electronic communication for both the underserved and unserved communities across the country.

She noted: “The Ministry of Communications is understandably excited by the partnership between GIFEC, mobile network operators, the government of China and Huawei Technologies on this project.”

The minister further added that the project will extend “connectivity to all parts of the country in the next 18 months connecting some 3.4million Ghanaians to voice and data networks.”

She further enumerated some policy initiatives by the government aimed at digitising Ghana.

“Matic weather stations for Ghana Meteorological Agency, modernisation of Judicial Service, Ghana Revenue Authority and the Registrar platform to automate the delivery of government goods and services on a single digital platform.

“We’re also deploying a nation-wide dedicated telecommunications network to all districts in the country to connect public institutions, Ministries, Departments and Agencies. This will be connected to the newly commissioned security operations centre of the National Information Technology Agency (NITA) for protection of this critical national information infrastructure. It will enable the Ministry of Communication to ensure that all MMDAs are connected to the National Fibre Optic Network to foresee and ensuring transparency in financial administration of this country,” the Communications Minister said.

She further called for a need to explore options to address the country’s connectivity gap and emphasised the importance of the project to the government in implementing solutions and programmes to facilitate rural connectivity.

“We need to look at options in terms of technology business models and partnerships to address the connectivity gap in the country and this project is a good example of public-private partnership which works.

“We intend to roll out 1000 sites by December this year,” she said.

The Minister also stressed on the need to provide access to telephony services for all persons across the country.

“No one regardless of their financial, economic, social status or location should be deprived of access to quality telephony services and thankfully, we’re here today, to make this possible for all,” Mrs Owusu-Ekuful added.