Fintech, telcom firms driving financial inclusion in Ghana - UBA MD

Managing Director of United Bank for Africa (UBA), Abiola Bawuah has called for the commendation of financial technology companies and telecommunications citing them to be responsible for driving financial inclusion in the country.

“I know we’re screaming, we those in banks, talking about they have to be regulated but the truth is that today a lot of people too would not have had anything to do with banks but for the FinTech groups; and we appreciate them and we should appreciate them for that, because but for them a lot of money will still be circulating outside banking.” She said.

In a presentation themed ‘Who is threatening the lions of the banking jungle’, the UBA Managing Director noted that FinTechs and telcos have extended the frontiers of banking positively, adding that there was the need for bankers to embrace a possible collaboration with the financial technology companies and telecommunication groups.

Using a quote by Philipe Gelis ?CEO at KANTOX, a FinTech company which states that;

“FinTech is changing the finance sector just like the internet changed the written press and the music industries. In what is a stagnant sector monopolized by banks finance is ripe for innovation and FinTechs is unquestionably the catalyst needed for change,” Mrs Bawuah called for her colleagues in the sector to buckle up to address the challenges.

Ghana’s FinTech ecosystem is one of the most active ones in the sub-Saharan region. An emerging markets financial services fund; Leapfrog Investments has invested over $15 million in Ghana’s insurance sector since 2012, research has shown.