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A fresh disagreement has emerged over the state of Ghana’s rural telephony programme, with the New Patriotic Party (NPP) challenging the government’s assessment of the project and demanding detailed records to support claims made about rural connectivity infrastructure.

The party says questions remain over how many telephony sites are currently functioning, how many have been connected to networks, and what has become of sites that were completed before the change of government.

At the centre of the dispute are recent comments by Communications Minister Samuel Nartey George on rural connectivity and plans to upgrade telephony sites to 4G. The NPP argues that public debate on the project should be guided by verified data rather than competing political narratives.

According to the party, thousands of sites were either completed or nearing completion under the previous administration as part of a nationwide effort to expand telecommunications access to underserved communities. It contends that the focus should now be on activating inactive infrastructure and completing outstanding connections.

The NPP has also disputed suggestions that some remote sites remain disconnected because of technical limitations, insisting that the necessary infrastructure already exists to support connectivity in those areas.

To settle the matter, the party is calling on the Ministry of Communication, Digital Technology and Innovations and the Ghana Investment Fund for Electronic Communications (GIFEC) to publicly account for the project’s current status within 30 days. It wants a breakdown of operational and inactive sites, a schedule for outstanding deployments, and details of any planned upgrades.

The party further wants Parliament’s Select Committee on Communications briefed on the project, maintaining that transparency is necessary to establish the true state of rural connectivity across the country.

Source: CNR