Ghana’s communications regulator has outlined a new approach to spectrum management, insisting that licensing must translate into measurable service improvements rather than mere assignment of airwaves.
The Director-General of the National Communications Authority (NCA), Edmund Yirenkyi Fianko, made the declaration at a joint industry forum marking the NCA’s 30th anniversary and the 15th anniversary of the Ghana Chamber of Telecommunications. He described spectrum as a finite national resource requiring precision management and stressed that the regulator’s framework would be anchored on transparency, predictability, and rigorous execution.
“A healthy market requires both effective regulation and sustained commercial ambition,” Fianko said, framing the regulator’s posture as one of partnership rather than confrontation.
He said future spectrum pricing must carefully balance government revenue objectives against the need to incentivise network investment and rapid deployment, warning that assigning spectrum without guaranteeing quality service delivery defeats its purpose entirely.
Fianko also elevated Quality of Service (QoS) and Quality of Experience (QoE) to the top of the NCA’s regulatory priorities for the year, citing surging data demand and rising consumer expectations as pressures the sector can no longer absorb without structural response. He called on operators to deploy sustainable backup power systems, strengthen network redundancy and extend infrastructure coverage in underserved communities.
On market competition, he defended the NCA’s Significant Market Power (SMP) framework, introduced in 2020, describing it as a tool to sustain competition, enforce pricing discipline and stimulate innovation rather than penalise dominant operators. He nonetheless urged telecom companies to compete more aggressively and invest strategically, arguing that regulation alone cannot deliver the sector improvements consumers demand.
The NCA boss reiterated that responsibility for service quality is shared between regulator and industry, with the authority committed to setting standards and enforcing compliance while expecting operators to take full ownership of the customer experience.
Ghana’s telecom sector marks 30 years of regulatory oversight at a moment of growing infrastructure pressure, with fibre damage, spectrum constraints and service quality gaps posing simultaneous challenges to a sector that has expanded internet penetration from four percent to over 70 percent in 15 years.
