MTN Ghana’s operational performance in the first quarter was anchored on its execution of various ‘Ambition 2025’ initiatives in data, MoMo and digital services.
Amid accelerated digitalisation, MTN has committed to spend $149 million in total capex in the year to meet the demand of digital services and help maintain the quality and availability of service for our data and Mobile Money customers. As part of MTN’s network expansion plan, the company rolled out 36 2G, 36 3G, 36 4G sites and modernized 223 existing sites to 4G sites in the quarter. This investment helped support 64.0% growth in data traffic and reach a total of 2,160 4G sites nationwide resulting in an increase in our 4G population coverage from 71.7% to 76.1%.
Performance in the first quarter of 2021 was influenced by the protracted impact of the pandemic. As a result of this MTN Ghana carried on with its work to support lives through its Y’ello Hope initiatives. Key amongst these initiatives is that as at April 5, 2021, MTN had delivered 356,000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine to support the Ghana Government’s efforts in fighting the COVID-19 pandemic. This is part of the commitment made by MTN Group to provide US$25 million to support the African Union’s COVID-19 vaccination programme and help secure up to seven million doses of the vaccine for health workers across the continent.
Operational review
MTN’s subscriber base grew by 0.6 million to 25.0 million, as the company improved its network and customer experience. Continued demand for data and increased adoption of more digital payment services supported the company’s active data* subscribers’ growth of 0.4 million to reach 11.2 million and MoMo users growth of 0.1 million to reach 10.7 million. The number of MoMo merchants expanded by 11,000 to 183,000 and our agent network by 15,000 to 221,000.
MTN also improved on its ayoba offerings with enhancements including payment integration and new business-to-customer channels. Additionally, MTN enhanced self-service offerings on myMTN app, introducing MoMo and mobile broadband channels to the app to improve the feature set and customer experience.
Commenting on the quarterly results, the CEO of MTN Ghana, Selorm Adadevoh said, MTN remains committed to providing support to combat COVID-19. As we progress through 2021, we will remain focused on supporting our people, our customers and Government, while ensuring network resilience as this is critical to the continued recovery of the economy.
Update on localisation of Scancom PLC and MobileMoney Limited
MTN continues to work with the Government of Ghana and key regulatory stakeholders to achieve all agreed localisation requirements. MTN Group remains committed to sell a further 8.1% of its investment in Scancom PLC to achieve 25% localisation.
MTN Ghana’s 25th anniversary
This year marks MTN Ghana’s 25th anniversary, a significant milestone in our journey to provide vital telecommunication and digital services in Ghana. We have committed to contribute the equivalent of $25 million (or GH¢150 million) over three years to a fund supporting Ghana’s post-COVID-19 recovery efforts. It is our belief that this will go a long way to support digital ecosystem projects as part of government’s long-term transformation agenda. We will share more details as discussions progress.
Outlook
The company believes that the remainder of 2021 will be shaped by the extent of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
MTN Ghana remains committed to supporting government’s ambition of a digital Ghana and we have designated 2021 as the ‘Year of the customer: the digital experience’. We are excited about the opportunity to be part of the Ghana digital journey as we play our part through the many digital services.
