The deputy governor of Uganda’s central bank said that mobile financial services (MFS) have outnumbered the traditional bank account holders in 2012. The MFS transactions have totalled UGX11.7 trillion (USD4.374 billion) in 2012, up from UGX3.75 trillion in 2011. The number of MFS users has been raised to an estimated 8.9 million from 2.8 million, tapping into Uganda’s huge unbanked population and surpassing 3.6 million traditional bank accounts.
The Deputy Bank of Uganda governor, Dr Louis Kasekende, told stakeholders at a function at which MTN Uganda released its 2012 financial results that Shs11.7 trillion went through the mobile money platform provided by the major players including MTN, Aitrel, Warid and Uganda Telecom’s systems last year.
The growth in mobile money platform means that more Ugandans have gained confidence in the use of the mobile money platform to send and receive money, as opposed to commercial banks and other traditional such as Western Union.
The massive uptake of mobile money service— an electronic platform that enables mobile phone subscribers to send and receive money using their phones— can be explained by the rapid growth in mobile phone penetration.
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