Sam George, the Minister of Communication, Digital Technology and Innovations, has been vindicated following the Supreme Court finding Vodafone Ghana liable for privacy breach.
The Supreme Court, in a majority decision of 4 – 1, held that Vodafone Ghana Limited breached the data privacy rights of its customer, Elorm Kwami Gorni.
Elorm Kwami Gorni’s Ghana Card details were used to register another person’s MoMo account.
The Law Platform providing more details stated, “The Supreme Court in a majority decision of 4 – 1, Dzamefe dissenting, has held that Vodafone Ghana Limited breached the data privacy rights of their customer, Elorm Kwami Gorni, Appellant in the case, by allowing the registration and the mobile money wallet operation of a number unknown to the Appellant using the Ghana Card details of Elorm Gorni without his consent.
In the well-researched and reasoned majority decision of the Supreme Court through the voice of the Professor of Law, H/L Justice Prof. Mensa-Bonsu, the court made a discussion of the Data Protection Act 2012 (Act 843) by reliance on the two famous Supreme Court cases on privacy rights, MRS ABENA POKUAA ACKAH v. AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT BANK [TLP-SC-2017-58]; RAPHAEL CUBAGEE v. MICHAEL YEBOAH ASARE & 2 ORS [TLP-SC-2018-13] and the persuasive force of the data privacy right case of Justice Noah Adade v. Bolt Ghana Limited & Bolt Holdings OU
The discussion of the Court, which suffered a dissent from Senyo Dzamefe JSC, also relied on scholarly material, including that of Francisca Kusi-Appiah: ‘Consumer Rights and Justice in Ghana: A Legal Compass’, K-App Law, Accra, Ghana 2025, pp 123. 262 and p.419. and James Whisker, Mark Eshwar Lokanan, “Anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing threats posed by mobile Money.”, in Journal of Money Laundering Control, https://doi.org/10.1108/JMLC-10-2017-0061.
The Court, in the voice of Kulendi JSC, who offered a concurring opinion to the erudite opinion of Justice Mensa-Bonsu, held that “15. In my considered opinion, the failure of the 1st Respondent to ensure the effective implementation of such basic verification measures at the initial stage of the registration exercise constituted a clear dereliction of the Respondent’s statutory obligations and effectively created the conditions under which the Appellant’s personal data could be misused, ultimately resulting in the unauthorized activation of a mobile money account in the Appellant’s name, which by all standards, amounted to an invasion of his privacy under Article 18 of the Constitution.”
The Law Platform added, “The Court thus granted the 1st and 2nd reliefs of the Plaintiff/Appellant/Appellant and awarded nominal damages of GH¢10,000 despite being alarmed by the possibility of the misuse of the identity details of the Appellant and the existence and risk of money laundering activities through such misuse of data.
Prof Mensa-Bonsu delivered herself on the alarming nature of the possibility of identity misuse as follows: “It should thus be a matter of alarm if someone with access to another’s personal documentation could use it to register his or her own or even a third person’s internet identity without the owner’s consent or authorisation.”
The news comes at a time when Sam Nartey George, the Minister for Communication, Digital Technology and Innovations, has disclosed that the planned SIM registration will be rolled out in the third quarter of 2026.
It will be recalled that Sam Nartey George ruled out automatic migration of existing SIM data into the new system, announcing that the upcoming SIM registration will be Ghana’s first with a proper biometric registration.
According to Sam George, the new SIM registration is intended to correct flaws from the old registration.
The sector minister is quoted by a GHOne news flyer to have said, “This will be the first time in Ghana’s history that we will have a proper biometric SIM registration”.
Also, Sam George assured Ghanaians that the upcoming SIM registration exercise will be the last.
According to him, the government rolls out a robust, technology-driven system designed to enhance convenience and eliminate fraud.
Speaking to stakeholders about the planned exercise, Sam George stated, “The fact that you have multi-agency collaboration on this is something that you didn’t see in previous times.
You have the NIA (National Identification Authority) being our single source of truth when it comes to IDs, the NCA (National Communications Authority), the ministry, Immigration Service, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and other agencies all working together.
“What you see today is the product of very hard and difficult conversations, and that gives me the confidence that if we execute this right, this will be the final SIM registration exercise,” Mr George explained.
“This registration is 75 per cent communication and 25 per cent technology,” he said
He further ruled out automatic migration of existing SIM data into the new system saying, “You are not cleaning up. You are actually migrating the viruses.
You have infected files, and you are migrating them onto a new system.
You are basically replicating the problems of the old system.
And that’s part of the reason why we can’t do a wholesale migration. And that’s cured today by NIA’s solution that they are offering to us based on the collaboration we are having with them,” he said.
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