According to the Executive Secretary of the Authority, Professor Kenneth Agyemang Attafuah, the Authority would also conduct a mop-up exercise in the Greater Accra Region for two weeks after the registration exercise in the Eastern Region.

“The management has made recommendations to the governing board. When the governing board directs, we will go back to the Eastern Region and complete the truncated process. When we finish the registration in the Eastern Region, we will come back to Greater Accra and do a mop-up for two weeks. During the period, we shall issue to Ghanaians in Greater Accra, the cards that have not been issued,” Prof Attafuah said on Accra-based radio station, Citi FM.

 The NIA suspended the Ghana Card registration exercise in the Eastern Region following an interlocutory injunction application filed at the High Court restraining the Authority from continuing with the registration exercise.

Before the suspension, the NIA, however, insisted that its decision to carry on with the Ghana Card registration exercise in the Eastern Region was not violating the directives concerning public gatherings.

This was despite reports that citizens looking to register for the card were massing up at some registration centres in contravention of expert advise for curbing the spread of the novel coronavirus pandemic.

Observers also criticised the NIA for continuing with the exercise.

The Commission on Human Rights and Administrative Justice (CHRAJ), for example, said the continuation of the registration was a breach of international and regional human rights instruments, while CHRAJ in a statement also said the NIA’s actions were a disregard of the existing World Health Organization (WHO) precautionary measures aimed at containing and combating the novel coronavirus.

The Ghana Medical Association (GMA) also complained that the continuation of the exercise defeated the precautionary measures declared by the state to combat the pandemic.