Accra, April 9, 2025 – Minister for Communications and Digital Technology, Sam Nartey George, has announced that the government will not extend the controversial Kelni-GVG Common Monitoring Platform contract upon its expiration.

Speaking at his first quarterly media briefing, Mr. George cited major concerns over lack of transparency and poor value for money in the deal, revealing that the state is now paying 84% of the revenue generated just to monitor telecom traffic.

“The State is paying far more to monitor the revenue than it retains,” he stated, adding that the National Communications Authority (NCA) has been directed to prepare to independently manage the revenue assurance system going forward.

The Minister also highlighted a series of irregularities within the National Information Technology Agency (NITA), including questionable payments to Sawtel Ltd and Dataceum Ltd for project management services under the Digital Services and Payment Platform (DSPP) Call Centre contract. Both contracts expired in February 2024, yet NITA continues to make payments despite no formal renewal.

Additionally, Mr. George has initiated an audit of the Smart Infraco (Lebara Ghana Ltd) e-Government Infrastructure Agreement. Findings revealed NITA had no access to vital systems it owns, and was unable to track revenues due to the absence of audit dashboards.

“I directed Smart Infraco to grant full physical and logical access to the infrastructure and to settle outstanding payments, including over $6 million owed in fees and revenue shares,” Mr. George said.

He emphasized that certain contracts have been forwarded to the Attorney-General for review and legal advice.

“One thing is clear – I will clean up the Ministry and its Agencies. It is my solemn pledge to the President and the people of Ghana,” he concluded.