Business News of Tuesday, 15 May 2018
Source: citinewsroom.com
2018-05-15
Archie Hesse, Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana Interbank Payment and Settlement System (GhIPSS)
The Chief Executive Officer of the Ghana Interbank Payment and Settlement System (GhIPSS), Archie Hesse has refuted assertions that the mobile money interoperability project recently launched by the Vice President is not working.
He explained that they have a team including himself who have been reviewing transactions that have taken place on the system since it was launched on May 10, 2018.
“I will be very surprised because on a daily basis I have records of all the volume transactions. Since we went live on the 10th of May we meet on a daily basis to review transactions of previous days,” Archie Hesse said in an interview on the Citi Breakfast Show on Tuesday.
Mr. Hesse made the rebuttal following allegations by a former Deputy Finance Minister, Casiel Ato Forson that the interoperability system was not functioning properly.
The GhIPSS CEO said they recorded about 3,000 transactions within the system on the first day it was launched and has been increasing geometrically ever since then.
“I am quite happy to share the volumes with you. If I remember correctly the first the day we launched it, that day, in particular, we had over 3,000 transactions that went through the switch,” he said.
In January 2017, the issue of mobile money interoperability came to the fore when telecom operators kicked against moves by the central bank to impose a third-party company to implement the interoperability at the cost of GHc4.6 billion.
Following agitations, the government revoked the contract and challenged GHiPSS to make mobile money interoperability possible.
$4.5 million loans used to build momo interoperability platform
Mr Hesse in the interview also stated that a loan of 4.5 million dollars from the Bank of Ghana was used to implement the mobile money interoperability project.
According to him, the BoG gave the funds to the company with set benchmarks for the next five years to enable GHIPSS to pay back the loans.
The clarification comes after the NDC claimed it had a much-sophisticated plan that accounted for the GHc4.5 billion budget for the interoperability system.
Dr Bawumia launched the first phase of the mobile money interoperability system on May 10. According to Mr Hesse, GhIPSS is working on the second phase of the project which includes bringing on board the e-zwich platform in the next two months.
The mobile money interoperability, managed by the GhIPSS, is to enhance financial inclusion in the country and to make electronic payments easier.
The phase one of the interoperability allows mobile customers to move money from their mobile money accounts to bank accounts and vice versa as well as from one mobile money platform to the other.