Ghana's NCA Must Take A Leaf From Britain's Ofcom's Book!

The nonsensical demand for "an independent technical arbiter" made on behalf of the telecommunications companies operating in Ghana, by their well-funded lobbying body, the so-called Telecoms Chamber, is yet another example, of the disrespect shown to our institutions of state, by many foreign investors operating in Ghana.

Would Vodafone Ghana, for example - which, incidentally, did not pay even a pesewa for its valuable 3G license, because of the stupidity and greed of some of our previous rulers - have had the temerity to make such an absurd demand to Ofcom, the UK's independent regulator, and competition authority, for that nation's communications industry's players?

As a wag I know, said to me recently, in a conversation centred on how the telcos operating in Ghana, are getting away with ripping phone users off (both mobile and land-line), with complete impunity: "Kofi, it is precisely because there is no shortage of willing local lackeys (those confounded quislings and stooges for neo-colonialism and imperialism, in our midst, in Nkrumah's Ghana), always happy to do their dirty work for them, that they can behave in such arrogant and disrespectful ways - which they would never dream of doing in their countries of domicile." How very true.

To be charitable to the hapless Kweku Sakyi Addo, whose Telecoms Chamber is actually the industry's paid lobbyist - let us not forget - and in many ways is a really splendid fellow, perhaps the old cynic who made the above observation, was being a tad unfair to him, but it is important that he does not see his handsomely compensated work, simply as making endless excuses for the telcos operating here.

He must rather ask for forbearance on the part of phone users in Ghana, at every opportunity he gets to interact with them, and the Ghanaian media - whiles he gets the crafty telcos to work in assiduous fashion, to overcome their sodden challenges, whatever they are.

Phone users in Ghana just want good quality, world-class service - not endless excuses and smug passing-the-buck PR. That is insulting their intelligence. Period.

Luckily, the current head of the National Communications Authority (NCA), has shown that he is a true patriot and Ghanaian nationalist of the first order - and the result is that unlike the past, the NCA of today, is firmly on the side of consumers in Ghana, who use mobile phones and land-line phones.

Consequently, my humble advice to the NCA, in this matter that is an egregious example of sharp-practice-in-commerce, affecting the welfare of millions of Ghanaian consumers, is simply to take a good look at Ofcom's website, and replicate it (adapting it to suit local conditions where necessary) here quickly - to provide an interactive online platform, through which the general public in Ghana, can fight to get quality service from those perfidious entities: who virtually have a license, literally, to print money in Ghana.

There is nothing quite like online opprobrium, delivered at the click of a computer mouse or the pressing of a mobile device's sent-key by disaffected phone users, to shame even the most thick-skinned executive, in charge of an arrogant and hard-of-hearing telecommunications multinational, operating in an emerging market.

In the light of all the above, therefore, dear reader, an interactive NCA website, just like that of the UK's Ofcom, is precisely what is needed to keep the telco's operating here in check, in a transparent manner - which is why it is vital that the NCA takes a leaf from Ofcom's book, in that regard.