Ghana is first African country to implement mobile interoperability system – Bawumia

Vice President, Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia, has averred that the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP) was the first to introduce a mobile interoperability network system on the African continent.

Speaking at the NPP International Women's Conference in the United Kingdom on Saturday, June 10, 2023, Dr. Bawumia said the introduction of mobile interoperability into the financial space has facilitated the transaction of funds from a phone to a bank account and vice versa.

The free flow of funds can also be done from one telecommunication network to another.

While touting the achievement of government, the vice president further said his government has implemented a digital property address system.

“Majority of adults did not have bank accounts and many people face difficulties in opening a bank account because of literacy and looking for referees and so on but as a result of mobile money interoperability, the vast majority of Ghanaians now practically have a bank account,” he said.

He added that, “To open a bank account today, all you need is a Ghana card and a mobile phone. You don’t need to fill forms anymore. You will just get a USSD (Unstructured Supplementary Service Data) code from the bank; dial that code, they’ll ask you your Ghana card number, put it in; end of story, your bank account is opened for you and off you go."

He continued that, “So today if you are in Ghana and you don’t have a bank account, then it’s because you don’t want one because we have put in the vehicle for everyone to have a bank account and that has made Ghana, the number one country in Africa as far as financial inclusion is concerned. We are the number one in the whole of Africa."

“And what we have done with mobile money interoperability, we are the first in Africa to do so and I’m yet to find out another country that has been able to do so,” he touted.

On May 10, 2018, the Ghana Chamber of Telecommunications together with the Government of Ghana, Central Bank, GhIPSS and commercial banks launched the mobile money interoperability system in Accra.

The mobile money payment interoperability is a service that allows direct and seamless transfer of funds from one mobile money wallet to another mobile money wallet across networks.

It was developed by Ghana Interbank Payment and Settlement Systems (GhIPSS).

The move lowers cost of transactions, increases service reach and reduces reliance on cash for payments.


VKB/ESA