In this new Digital age in Africa this follows a barrage of criticism from a broad segment of Ghana's populace since the country's finance minister announced it in November 2021. Some industry stakeholders welcome the charge, while others feel it will have a detrimental influence on digital payments and will jeopardize Ghana's digitalization efforts.
A debate about the news on levy's introduction sparked a clash in parliament in December of last year. Despite this, the Ghana Revenue Authority, banks and specialized deposit-taking institutions (DFIs), electronic money issuers (EMIs), and telecommunications companies (telcos) say they have put in place the necessary systems and mechanisms to begin collecting a levy of 1.5 percent on daily electronic transfers.
All charges will be born by the sender once the implementation is complete, with the exception of inward remittances, which will be borne by the receiver. According to the Finance Minister, overall digital transactions in Ghana are expected to exceed GH500 billion (US$81 billion) in 2020, up from GH78 billion (US$12.5 billion) in 2016.
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Ghana will not be the first African government to charge a fee for online transactions. Across Africa, some countries have struggled to implement such a charge, while others have been successful. In Uganda, the tax on electronic transactions was heavily criticized, thus it was decreased to 0.5 percent for withdrawals only.
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