Telecoms regulator National Communication Authority (NCA) has denied allegations being peddled by Obuasi West MP Kwaku Kwarteng that authority is wrongfully paying an organization for a duplicate job.

In a two-page letter to the Minister of Communications, dated January 27, 2016, and copied to  President John Mahama and others, the MP alleged that NCA is criminally paying Afriwave Telecoms Ghana for the same international monitoring of traffic job Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) is paying Subah Infosolution Limited to do.

Director-General of NCA, William Tevie told Adom News Kwaku Kwarteng’s allegation "is an absolute falsehood.There is no iota of truth in what he is saying - we have not paid Afriwave a pesewa."

He explained that since the Subah contract with GRA is due to end in May 2016, the NCA asked Afriwave, which has been legally licensed, to connect their equipment to the telcos billing nodes and "do testing to check for correctness" before they take over from Subah in May.

"Afriwave has finished connecting their equipment to the telcos but it will take three to four months to check for correctness so that the takeover from Subah will be smooth - that is what we are doing and Afriwave is not being paid for that," he said.

The NCA boss said it is important for the taxpayer to understand that Subah and Afriwave are not doing any parallel monitoring of international traffic and the NCA has not paid any money to Afriwave.

He also pointed out that the racks at the telcos premises belong to the NCA and so the NCA have every right to authorize any legal entity to connect equipment on those racks.

Afriwave

Meanwhile, Kwaku Kwarteng also claimed there is rumor that Communications Minister Dr. Edward Omane Boamah has interest in Afriwave, but the CEO of Afriwave, Philip Sowah also described that claim as a "palpable falsehood"

He said: "Dr. Omane Boamah has never held and does hold any interest or shares in Afriwave."

Philip Sowah also reiterated the point that Afriwave has never issued any invoice to NCA for payment so "we don't know what Kwaku Kwarteng is talking about.

History

The history to this whole saga is that Afriwave won a competitive bid for the license to run a clearinghouse and also do revenue assurance for the state on both domestic and international telecom traffic.

But before Afriwave could even start work, Kwaku Kwarteng and others  sued Afriwave, NCA, and the telcos over the clearinghouse aspect of their work, contending that it was unconstitutional, unlawful and unnecessary.

Subah was one of the companies in the competitive bid and they lost to Afriwave. But at the time Afriwave got the license, Subah had a contract with GRA to do revenue assurance on both the local and international fronts.

Meanwhile, international traffic monitoring is under the purview of NCA so the NCA asked Subah to quit that aspect of the job since there is a licensee, Afriwave, for it.

NCA then asked the telecom operators to allow Afriwave to connect its monitoring equipment on their international traffic billing nodes and collect data for the NCA.

But GRA challenged the NCA on that, and threatened the telcos with sanctions if they stopped cooperating with Subah.

Subah also recently issued a threat of "something disastrous" happening if the NCA did not back off from their contract with GRA.

At some point, the Attorney-General advised that the Subah contract could be cancelled but at a loss to the state because GRA allegedly inserted a termination clause in the Subah contract, which said that government will bear all the liabilities of Subah if the contract was terminated ahead of May 2016 deadline.

Following a consensus meeting at the presidency, NCA agreed to allow the contract to run its full course till May 2016, but in the mean time Afriwave could go ahead and install their equipment on the telcos network and do testing ahead of the takeover.

Afriwave is now doing the testing at no fee to the state, but that is what Kwaku Kwarteng is alleging to be duplication of Subah's job and double for same job, a charge the NCA denies flatly as false and a display of ignorance.

Kwaku Kwarteng

Meanwhile, Kwaku Kwarteng and others are still in court challenge the legality of the clearinghouse. Court was adjourned to February 16, 2015.