The Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo government has come under scrutiny for reportedly awarding the contract to roll out a 5G network in Ghana by the end of 2024 to NextGen InfraCo Limited, a company that is only one week old.
The Minister of Communications and Digitalisation, Ursula Owusu-Ekuful, at a press briefing in Accra on Thursday, May 30, 2024, confirmed and justified the deal.
She stated that there was nothing wrong with NextGen being offered the contract because it was created specifically to deliver the service, due to the absence of existing "neutral infrastructure companies" capable of delivering it.
Earlier on Monday, before the minister’s press briefing, investigative journalist Manasseh Azure Awuni detailed the contract on Facebook and pointed out issues with the deal.
He stated that President Akufo-Addo granted executive approval for the 5G deal to NextGen just a week after the company was created, which, according to him, raises serious procurement concerns.
The journalist shared a supposed document from the Ministry of Communication and Digitalisation, which showed that President Akufo-Addo granted executive approval for the project on August 22, 2023.
"His Excellency the President granted Executive Approval on 22nd August 2023 for the introduction of 5G through the establishment of a neutral, wireless open access network to promote a vibrant telecom market in Ghana, further to a report presented to the President earlier that year," part of the document reads.
Another document he shared from the Registrar-General’s Department showed that the company was incorporated on August 16, 2023.
See the post and the documents below:
President Akufo-Akufo-Addo "granted Executive Approval on 22nd August 2023".
The company handed the deal was formed less than a week before the president's approval.The 5G technology, according to industry experts can be worth hundreds of millions of dollars. pic.twitter.com/2YPkxvVkRw
— Manasseh Azure Awuni (@Manasseh_Azure) May 30, 2024
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