The Vice President of the Republic, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia has underscored the importance of Ghana’s telecommunications sector undergoing a unified license regime – an agenda the Vice President refers to as the way forward to ensure alignment with our Telecoms Policy.
He made this statement during his keynote address to participants at an Industry breakfast meeting organized by the Ghana Chamber of Telecommunications under the theme: Leveraging effective use and distribution of Spectrum in Ghana for National Development at the Labadi Beach Hotel in Accra.
Outlining how Ghana’s National Telecom Policy created in 2005 was to adopt a neutral approach to regulation of the communications sector, the Vice President said “in practice the current licensing framework consists of a number of different service-specific license categories, which requires 17 different forms of permission to provide communications services to Ghanaians, Let us use this meeting to identify the way forward in ensuring alignment with section 2.1 of the above policy which states “Licensing and regulation shall be technologically neutral to encourage economically efficient and innovative market development”.
The Vice President also admonished for flexibility with regards to regulatory models in providing certainty in licensing. This he believes would reduce cost on service providers.
He said, “A finite roadmap is vital in supporting our market players and allowing flexibility, minimizing distortions from historic regulatory models, providing certainty in licensing, reducing compliance costs and allowing licensees deploy the most efficient and cost-effective network technologies”.
To that end, the Vice President said his government is willing to partner the industry and all key stakeholders, to consolidate efforts to leverage ICT for National development
through the elimination of bottlenecks in the distribution of spectrum.
Chief Executive of AirtelTigo, Mrs. Mitwa Keamba Ng’ambi in her welcome address reiterated the telecoms industry’s commitment in supporting the efforts of H.E The President’s vision of a Ghana Beyond Aid.
“I’d like to assure Your Excellency that we as Mobile Network Operators in the industry, see ourselves as partners to you on the developmental agenda for this country. Therefore, when we raise concerns and recommendations as an industry, we do so in good faith, in hope that we can together continue to drive the industry forward and create history in Ghana. We commit to supporting your efforts to achieving H.E The President’s drive of a Ghana Beyond Aid using the Telecommunications industry as a catalyst and the rails on which other sectors will ride. ”
The Breakfast meeting brought together senior government officials, Parliament, NCA, GSMA, Coleago, Ministry of Finance, and Ghana Revenue Authority, members of the Chamber, some senior editors and experts from the telecoms sector.
The event was in support of government’s vision to leverage ICT for national economic development and the drive towards a Ghana Beyond Aid.
Source: Chamber News Desk
