Parliament’s Defence and Interior Committee has extended the time for inputs on the interception of postal packets and telecommunications bill by two more weeks.

This comes after civil society groups raised concerns about the limited time for consultation and the poor education and publicity  given to the new bill.

The Bill, if passed into law, will allow personnel of the National Security to listen, record, monitor, intercept or tamper with telecommunication messages and postal packets.

The Bill, among other things, is to help in the fight against terrorism, money laundering and other trans-national criminal activities.

Deputy Director of Governance think tank, Centre for Democratic Development (CDD), Franklin Oduro, told Joy News that such an important bill which could infringe upon the privacy of Ghanaians should not be rushed.

"We think that the five days given is so short a time," Oduro stated, adding that, a wider consultation is needed nationwide.

In a response, the Chairman of Parliament’s Defence and Interior Committee, Fritz Baffour, told Joy News that they have extended the time for more memoranda from the public. 

"We have granted the extension for two weeks. It is a very contentious bill. Any bill or law that people believe will infringe on their liberties and freedoms is opened to a lot of contention so we want more inputs from all the various stakeholders," Baffour indicated.