Tap your card at Honeysuckle, send MoMo to your cousin in Kumasi or book a flight from Accra to Johannesburg and you’ve just triggered a financial relay more intricate than a Wagner opera.
What feels like instant convenience is, in reality, a meticulously choreographed procession involving banks, card schemes, gateways, fintechs and a rotating cast of intermediaries each shaving off their fee, claiming their fraction of the value you moved.
Payments may be dressed in the sleek robes of digital modernity but underneath, they are anything but simple.
In Ghana, this complexity takes on a hybrid shape. Mobile money has become the preferred payment rail, driven by the telcos like MTN, AT and Telecel. Over 70percent of adults are now financially included, thanks largely to mobile wallets.
Card penetration remains low, under 15percent yet Visa and Mastercard continue to collect their tolls on every swipe, online checkout or tap-to-pay moment, whether at Melcom, Cherleyan Restaurant at Tse Addo or a boutique in Osu.
Even when no plastic changes hands, the networks get paid. Convenience has a price, and in Ghana, that price is mostly denominated in fees paid to entities far beyond our borders.
Let’s be clear, every actor in this system is monetizing your transaction. Issuers, the banks or fintechs who provide your card or wallet earn from interchange, overdrafts, FX markups, and interest.
Acquirers, the ones who enable merchants to accept payments take a slice for every cedi processed. Card schemes like Visa or Mastercard?
They levy a quiet tax on every transaction for the right to use their rails. Gateways like ExpressPay or Flutterwave encrypt and route your payment while charging setup and transaction fees.
And aggregators, often the fintech darlings of the digital age package this labyrinth into one interface for SMEs and startups, all while profiting from volume and float. In this pyramid of payment, value accrues upward.
The architecture underpinning Ghana’s digital economy is functional, yes. But it’s also structurally dependent.
Ghana’s payments infrastructure may look local on the surface, a QR code here, a MoMo prompt there but much of it is foreign-owned, foreign-coded or built to be interoperable with global systems we didn’t design and don’t control.
Stripe, Paystack, Flutterwave, even the most local of players, often rely on protocols and partnerships with global networks.
Our banks settle on foreign rails. Our merchants pay foreign tolls. And our users, while delighted by the User Experience, remain unaware that their payments are quietly enriching someone else’s balance sheet.
To be fair, GhIPSS has made commendable strides. Platforms like Gh-Link and GhanaPay are an attempt to reclaim some control to offer rails that don’t bleed margin offshore.
But these local initiatives often lack the brand gravity, capital resilience and continent-wide ambitions of the Visa and Mastercards of the world.
A sovereign card scheme, no matter how noble, cannot scale without trust, acceptance, and critical mass. And that takes more than policy, it takes product-market fit at continental scale.
So, what’s the alternative? Imagine a Ghanaian-built, interoperable, export-grade payment stack, ISO-compliant yet mobile-first, designed to serve not just Accra or Abidjan, Bamako, or Banjul but Cape Town, Cairo, Addis Ababa, Nairobi and Tunis. A domestic aggregator with pan-African ambitions. A gateway infrastructure tailored for mobile-heavy, underbanked populations.
Think less “Made in Ghana” and more “Built for AFRICA.” That’s not patriotism, it’s an investment thesis. Global payments is a US$2 trillion industry.
Africa’s share is small, but growing fast. Ghana’s choice is clear, either keep paying the tolls, or start collecting them. Guess what! WE HAVE THE MEN & WOMEN.
The strategic implications are significant. A homegrown payments infrastructure wouldn’t just retain more value, it would reduce reliance on foreign tech, increase local data sovereignty, and potentially spark the next wave of fintech investment.
Capital markets would notice. So would regulators, developers, and startups looking for infrastructure that understands African realities rather than just accommodating them.
Because let’s not forget, seamless payments are only seamless for the user. Behind the curtain, it’s a slow, competitive, and ruthlessly monetized dance of margin, infrastructure, and influence.
Ghana, if it wants to be more than just another stop on someone else’s payment highway, must not only play in this game. It must build its own lane.
Author’s Note: This analysis is grounded in my professional observations and research within Ghana’s dynamic digital finance ecosystem. While I have endeavoured to provide thorough insights, I acknowledge the evolving nature of financial technologies, shifting regulatory landscapes, and emerging consumer behaviours that characterize this sector. I welcome constructive critique and encourage industry peers, stakeholders, and readers to share their perspectives. By exchanging knowledge and challenging assumptions, we can foster a deeper understanding of digital finance and financial inclusion in emerging markets. Let us engage in meaningful dialogue as we collectively pursue innovation and evidence-based progress in this transformative field. Some parts of this have been curated and rewritten with a generative application.
>>>the writer is a seasoned professional with nearly a decade of experience in Supply Chain Management. He holds a Master’s degree in Procurement and Supply Chain Management and is CIPS, GIPS and CMILT certified. He is also a certified Digital Finance Practitioner (CDFP) with a deep interest in digital payments, digital identity, and emerging technologies. Precious blends his expertise with a passion for innovation. A lifelong learner and student of life, He is committed to continuous growth and leveraging knowledge to drive transformative solutions.
