The recent controversy surrounding government’s revenue assurance monitoring contract with Kelni-GVG is needless, Communications Minister, Ursula Owusu-Ekuful has said.
Addressing Parliament on Thursday, Ursula noted that the telecom operators resisting the implementation of the deal in Ghana have willingly accepted and complied with a similar regime in Uganda and Rwanda without raising objections.
“One thing that I found most distressing about the conversations we had with the network operators is that in Rwanda and Uganda, this same GVG who is a partner to Kelni here is operating an identical system which they [network operators] are all happily working with without raising any issues at all and yet when it comes to implementing that same system in Ghana, they have problems with it and the question I ask is why and when I put it before the Telecoms chamber, they have the nerve to tell me that Ghana is not Rwanda which means they will apply the law in Rwanda but not in Ghana.
Mrs Owusu-Ekuful also issued a stern warning to telecom companies, “I have something to tell them, and I hope they hear me loud and clear, we are doing this despite whatever objections they raise. Ghana will be even more than Rwanda if they think they can have this attitude with us. I was really upset with them for actually having the nerve to utter those words to us, and I want to demonstrate to them that we will apply the lawfully to the letter no matter what they do but I want them to be clear that we are determined to follow through with this. We will not relent, we will not waiver, we have an excellent relationship with them, and we intend to continue to have an excellent relationship with them, but we will not allow any of them to take us for granted or look down on us in any form,” she said.
The Minister also said accusations of corruption and underhand dealings in the award of the revenue assurance monitoring contract to Kelni-GVG.
Ursula Owusu-Ekuful indicated that the 178 million dollar contract is the best deal the country can get for the kind of service needed.
She further stated that the country would own all the equipment for the execution of the contract after five years.
The Kelni-GVG deal has been the subject of public controversy since policy think tank, IMANI Africa raised the alarm over the cost of the project.
Delivering a statement in Parliament in response to a summon from the Speaker, Ursula Owusu said the deal would save the country more than a million dollars per month.
“This issue has, rather, unfortunately, generated some apprehension which in my view, is unnecessary…Inevitably, the monthly traffic data collated by the NCA and the network operators for free was substantially the same data presented by Subah and Afriwave for which the latter companies were paying 2.6 dollars per month. Mr Speaker, we were paying for no work done. This was the situation the NPP government inherited, and it clearly could not continue.”
“Mr Speaker, the fee for this transaction, $1.49 million per month, (as against the $2.6 million paid monthly to both Subah and Afriwave) is within the industry average for Platform as a Service (PaaS) contracts of this nature. The vendors have already procured and delivered equipment worth over $50m as part of the contract sum, at no extra cost to the state and this represents significant cost savings to the nation,” the Minister added.
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Source: Citinewsroom.com/Ghana
