NCA Wins Court Case over SIM Registration Deadline

Accra, November 23, 2022: The High Court in Accra presided over by His Lordship Justice Charles Edward Ekow Baiden has on Monday, 21^st November, 2022 ruled in favour of the National Communications Authority (NCA) in a case filed against the Authority by nine (9) Applicants in relation to the ongoing SIM Registration Exercise.

The Applicants sought to invite the Court to among other things:

• strike out the SIM registration deadline and its related sanctions.
• declare the NCA’s directive, which mandates that Ghanaians register their SIM Cards using the Ghana card as the only form of identification and subject them to punitive measures if they fail to register by the specified deadline, null and void. 

This application followed the Minister of Communications and Digitalisation’s extension of the deadline for the SIM card registration to 30^th September 2022 and subsequent declaration of punitive measures.

As part of the ruling of the case, the Court held that:

• The NCA has full legal mandate to conduct the SIM registration exercise.
• The NCA has not exceeded its powers or breached the natural justice principle as there has been sufficient extensions of the deadlines for the registration exercise.
• The National Identity Register,2012. Regulation 7 of L.I.2111 gives the NCA power to limit the National Identity document for the purpose of SIM registration to the Ghana card only.
• Dictates of national security and the need to prevent crime make it imperative that the NCA undertakes the SIM registration exercise.

The Authority takes this opportunity to remind all consumers that the SIM registration exercise is currently ongoing and consumers who have not yet registered their SIM Cards are entreated to do so.