Ghana’s telecom market leader, MTN Ghana, announced that in bid to provide ubiquitous telecom services for its customers, a princely amount of $2.4 billion has been spent on network upgrading and expansion in the past nine years.
The Corporate Services Executive of MTN Ghana, Mrs. Cynthia Lumor, disclosed this to selected members of the Journalists for Business Advocacy (JBA), an offshoot of the Ghana Journalists Association (GJA), at a day’s encounter in Accra over the weekend.
The meeting was organised by the JBA, and sponsored by MTN Ghana to update the journalists on progress, and challenges of the country’s telecom industry.
Mrs. Lumor spoke on the contribution of MTN Ghana and other telcos to the country’s economy at the meeting, which was attended by the Executive Director of the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA), Suleimana Braimah, the Senior Manager for MTN Ghana Corporate Communications, Mrs. Georgina Asare Fiagbenu, a Corporate Communications Manager at MTN Ghana, Ms. Efua Falconer, and the Communications Advisor (Media Relations) at MTN Ghana, Mrs. Afua Asafo-Adjei.
She was quick to add that the leading telecom service provider in the West African country would spend $103 million to expand and upgrade its network this year.
Mrs. Lumor reiterated MTN’s commitment to making continued investments in the network to keep up with changes in technology and customer demand, to ensure that customers’ selection of MTN as the network of choice is consistently reinforced.
“The fact that over 14 million subscribers in Ghana have selected MTN as their network of choice means we have a certain responsibility”.
As the leader in both voice and data, MTN is committed to lead the delivery of a bold new digital world to create a distinct experience for its customers, the corporate communications chief stated.
Touching on employment, Mrs. Lumor estimated the number of jobs created directly and indirectly by the company at 500,000, explaining that the ecosystem of dealers/distributors, retailers, suppliers, partners, recharge card printers, marketing and advertising firms, among others that depended on MTN for the sustainability of their businesses, meant that MTN had a duty to those companies and their employees to remain sustainable.
It is the light of these that we never stopped to plan, invest, and staying relevant to the community in which the telecom giant operates, she maintained.
On MTN’s tax obligation to the Ghana government, Mrs Lumor stated that for very GH¢1 spent by a customer, a total of 34.5% of it goes into the payment of taxes such as the Value Added Tax (VAT), National Health Insurance Levy (NHIL), National Communications Authority (NCA), and others.
While the MTN Ghana Foundation, the CRS wing of the telecom firm, has over the years spent over millions of Ghana cedis on numerous projects in health, education and economic empowerment across the country.
These efforts, according to her, had impacted positively on more than three million people directly and indirectly throughout Ghana.
Touching on challenges of the telcos, Mrs. Lumor lamented that the multiple taxes being charged by the government were having ripple effects on their businesses, and urged the government to withdraw some of the taxes, especially, the National Stabilisation Levy, which was introduced recently.
She also complained about the ongoing power crisis, which is hitting hard on the operations of MTN, and several other companies in the country.
In her own words: “For MTN and other big companies, the cost of the power crisis is greater. Our equipment are affected by the frequent power outages.
“Though, we have standby generators, the recent hikes on the prices of petroleum products further increased our cost of production,” the Corporate Services Executive of MTN Ghana stated.
MTN Ghana spent huge on electricity and fuel budgets last year, as the country had been plunged into more than two years of power crisis.
These were unanticipated costs last year, but the leading telecom service provider still needed to meet them, in order to provide its customers with the excellent services they deserve, Mrs Lumor told the journalists.
In a short message, the Executive Director of the Media Foundation for West Africa (MFWA), Suleimana Braimah, observed that advocacy journalism was what was lacking in the country, and encouraged the members of the JBA to keep it up.
He assured them that his organisation’s doors are open for their support, saying “Don’t hesitate to contact us any time you need our support”.
The Executive Director of the Journalists for Business Advocacy (JBA), Suleiman Mustapha, on behalf of the association, thanked the management of MTN Ghana for their continuous support, and urged other companies to emulate the telecom giant’s shining example.
Touching on some of the success stories of the JBA to African Eye News, Mr Mustapha noted that a research undertaken by JBA indicated that Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDAs) were either not aware or not concerned about the plight of SMEs, but were only interested in collecting levies from them.
“The advocacy by JBA has resulted in positive changes in policy and programmes in some districts,” he stated.
Instructively, the JBA was established out of the GJA’s special two-year project dubbed “Using the Media to Strengthen Business Advocacy”.
The project, co-facilitated by KAB Consult and sponsored by the Business Advocacy Challenge (BUSAC) Fund, begun in 2006, under the theme “Using the Media to Promote Small-Scale Business Concerns.”
Under the project, a core team of journalists undertook capacity development in business advocacy to create a multimedia platform to discuss the concerns of business, particularly SMEs.
In Ghana, the SMEs account for 90 per cent of enterprises of the economy, contributing about 60 per cent of employment, and about six per cent to GDP.
Picture: Corporate Services Executive of MTN Ghana, Mrs. Cynthia Lumor
African Eye News.com
