Update 7: Undersea Cable Disruptions Affect Data Services – Repair works on all undersea cable cuts repaired as of May 8, 2024

May 22, 2024: The National Communications Authority (NCA) wishes to inform the general public on the successful completion of repair works on all four (4) subsea cables affected by the March 14 disruptions, affecting mobile and fixed data services nationwide. They are since operational and have been providing service at full capacity since the completion of the repair works.

The repair works were completed as follows:                                                    

1. SAT3: 6^th April, 2024
2. ACE : 17^th April, 2024
3. WACS: 29^th April, 2024
4. MainOne: 8^th May, 2024.

According to the subsea cable service providers, all four cable faults were found at the crossing with a sub-sea canyon off the coast of Abidjan called Le Trou Sans Fond Canyon.

The NCA has since the March 14 incident issued further directives to mobile and subsea cable service providers in a bid to strengthen its regulatory oversight. They include:

1. A requirement for all submarine cable operators to submit their backup and redundancy plans to ensure business continuity and seamless connectivity to data services should their cables get cut or develop a major fault.
2. All Mobile Network Operators are to maintain their existing redundant submarine cable links within Ghana and to connect to a submarine cable provider in the sub-region that is currently not landing in Ghana.

This concludes the updates and information the Authority has been sharing on the Undersea Cable Disruptions which occurred on 14^th March, 2024.

The NCA is grateful for the interest, support and understanding displayed by all stakeholders within the internet value chain; consumers, mobile network operators and the sub marine cable operators and terrestrial fibre operators (AT, MTN, Telecel, ACE, MainOne, WACS, SAT-3 and C-Squared etc). You can be assured of our commitment to ensure sustainable service delivery to all users within the industry.