Cost of EC’s mobile voter verification too high – Group

The Youth Bridge Foundation (YBF) on Friday said the GH¢0.30p Short Message Service (SMS) charge by the Electoral Commission (EC) for one to verify his or her details in the provisional voter’s register was too high.

“We maintain that it could have been possible for the standard SMS cost to be charged for first SMS from any number and subsequently charge mobile phone users GH¢0.10p for any additional inquiries with a particular phone number.”

Mr Seth Oteng, Executive Director of the Foundation which seek to empower the Youth, said this in a press statement copied to the Ghana News Agency in Accra.

According him, the cost, if reduced would help achieve the key objectives of enhancing citizens’ access and promoting technology usage in Ghana’s electoral processes to increase public confidence.

“We therefore call on the partnering telecom operators (Telcos) in Ghana namely Tigo, MTN, Airtel, Vodafone, Expresso and GLO, to, within the context of their corporate social responsibility (CSR) make it cheaper for the EC to introduce this and call for more innovation into Ghana’s electoral processes without having to pass the premium cost on to citizens”.

Mr Oteng indicated that the premium cost of GH¢0.30p per SMS for using the platform was poorly communicated on all platforms, calling on the Media and Civil Society to compliment efforts of the EC to increase public education on the technology and its related cost.

The Foundation however commended the EC for adopting the SMS technology to expand citizens’ access to the provisional voter’s register currently on-going.

Source: GNA