The entire country was plunged into an internet blackout yesterday, causing a huge stir in Ghana, especially among enterprises that rely heavily on the internet to be productive.
In what began as a normal internet fluctuation, compelling users to refresh their internet devices severally, reports went viral with the speed of light, announcing that internet services were down.
Almost all the telecommunications networks in Ghana were affected, and reports suggest even neighboring Nigeria, South Africa, Liberia, and Cote d’Ivoire also suffered the internet blackout.
A statement issued by the Ghana Chamber of Telecommunications on Thursday, March 14, 2024, reported a significant disruption in the telecommunications sector.
According to the press release, multiple submarine fiber optics cables that provide internet connectivity to the country had experienced outages.
The statement said some of these cables were completely down, while others were only delivering limited capacity.
This is impacting internet, data, and Voice over IP (VoIP) services of the members of the Chamber; the Mobile Network Operators, and the Data Service Providers to varying degrees. As a result, customers and subscribers are currently experiencing service challenges, it stated.
However, the Ghana Chamber of Telecommunications apologized to customers and said investigations were being carried out, as well as work to resolve the current problems to restore service to customers.
This development appears to be a baptism of fire for Telecel, a few days after taking over officially from Vodafone Ghana.
In the early hours of Thursday, the company sent a bulk text message to its customers, informing them of the challenge, while apologizing for any inconvenience caused.
The text message said: Dear customer, we are currently experiencing challenges with our data services on the mobile and fixed network. Our engineers are working to restore services as soon as possible. We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience caused.
MTN Ghana also issued an apology to its customers for the disruption in accessing data services and reaching their call center.
According to the company, it is due to an issue with their international undersea cables, resulting in significant challenges for Subscribers who rely on MTN’s services for their daily communication and internet needs.
MTN said its technical teams were working with their international partners to resolve the issue as quickly as possible.
At the time of going to press last night, channelstv.com in Nigeria had reported that damage to at least three subsea cables off the West Coast of Africa on Thursday disrupted internet services in Nigeria, Ghana, and other countries across the continent.
The report said telecommunications subscribers and bank users were stranded for hours as the disruption paralyzed digital transactions and internet communication.
It referred to one of the world’s leading financial news organizations, Bloomberg, as saying that the West Africa Cable System, MainOne, and ACE sea cables — arteries for telecommunications data — were all affected on Thursday.
Channelstv.com said according to data from internet analysis firms including NetBlocks, Kentik, and Cloudflare, the cut triggered outages and connectivity issues for mobile operators and internet service providers across the West African sub-region.
They further reported that the cause of the cable faults had not yet been determined as of their press time and the main actors had not released any official communication.
