A strong case is emerging for Ghana to adopt common open banking API standards to accelerate financial inclusion, foster innovation, and improve digital service delivery across the financial ecosystem.
An Open Banking API is a secure way for banks and other financial institutions to share financial data with authorized third-party providers (TPPs).
At a recent industry dialogue, key figures from Ghana Interbank Payment and Settlement Systems (GhIPSS), MobileMoney LTD, and IMANI Center for Policy and Education called for urgent collaboration among banks, fintechs, and regulators to create a unified national framework for open banking and interoperability.
They made the call at the 2025 Fintech Stakeholder Forum in Accra on the theme: “Harnessing Ghana’s Fintech Potential: Regulatory Frameworks for Digital Credit and Digital Assets.”
The forum, organised by MobileMoney LTD, brought together regulators, fintech firms, banks, policy experts, and academia deliberated on how Ghana could strengthen digital payments and ensure responsible innovation in the growing fintech space.
Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of GhIPSS, Clara B. Arthur, emphasized that interoperability already offered a pathway to open banking and API standardization in Ghana’s payments landscape.
She said common API standards across the banking and fintech ecosystem would make integration with the national payment infrastructure much easier and more efficient.
“Interoperability affords answers to API and open banking,” Ms. Arthur stated.
“These can be achieved if all players have common API standards, which will make it easier for fintechs to connect to the national payment infrastructure and for banks to integrate more seamlessly.”
She explained that GhIPSS intended to lead collaboration with banks and fintechs to resolve challenges surrounding connectivity, integration, and governance.
The goal, she said, was to develop nationally accepted technical and governance standards that will enable the Bank of Ghana (BoG) to implement forward-looking policies in support of digital financial transformation.
“Having common API standards in payments is key,” she reiterated.
“GhIPSS will champion work with banks and fintechs to address issues around governance and integration. Once we have national standards, the Bank of Ghana can roll out the right policies.”
Arthur also underscored the importance of a shared digital identity layer that would sit on top of Ghana’s payments ecosystem to enable authentication and secure access across platforms.
According to her, such a shared identity system—integrated with open banking APIs—would provide a trusted framework for citizens to access multiple financial and government services digitally.
“A shared digital ID layer on top of everything would allow us to achieve all that has been mentioned,” she said.
“We must also have real-time settlements for real-time payments. The technology exists; what is required is collective effort to use it effectively to solve problems and give value to citizens,” she stressed.
Open APIs are the future of fintech collaboration
Echoing the call for open banking standards, Chief Product and Services Officer at MML, Sylvia Otuo-Acheampong, said that open APIs represented the future of financial technology integration and collaboration.
She explained that MTN MobileMoney already operated an open API platform that allowed partners to connect and build services on top of its infrastructure.
“MobileMoney has an open API where partners can integrate immediately,” she said.
“It took a while for partners to trust MobileMoney’s open API, but once they did, it created new opportunities for innovation and access.”
According to Otuo-Acheampong, MTN MobileMoney has engaged multiple fintech partners this year, aiming to expand financial access through applications that rely on API integration.
However, she cautioned that not all fintechs were prepared to adopt API-based service delivery, which remained a key challenge in scaling digital financial products.
“To grow access through apps, the API must be the central integration point,” she stressed.
“Open API is the way into the future for aggregation to move the industry forward.”
She urged both regulators and ecosystem players to accelerate trust-building, capacity development, and interoperability standards, which would allow fintechs to easily plug into larger platforms such as MobileMoney, GhIPSS and banks.
Adding a policy perspective, Selorm Branttie, Technology Policy Analyst and Vice-President of the IMANI Center for Policy and Education, argued that open banking APIs could solve long-standing structural and operational challenges in Ghana’s financial services sector.
According to him, open APIs would enhance trust, enable faster product innovation, and ensure better responsiveness to market needs.
“Open banking API solves a lot of issues for service providers,” Branttie said. “It ensures trust and better responsiveness to the market.”
However, he cautioned that Ghana’s open banking efforts must not exist in isolation.
To fully realize the benefits, Branttie called for harmonization between the Open Banking Initiative and the National Data Harmonization Framework, which is currently being developed to streamline digital identity, data governance, and access management across sectors.
“We must harmonize the Open Banking Initiative with the National Data Harmonization Framework,” he explained.
“Doing so will consolidate Ghana’s position as Africa’s fintech leader—ahead of Nigeria and on par with Kenya—with the most robust regulatory ecosystem in West Africa.”
Branttie further noted that such harmonization would not only make financial integration easier but also enhance consumer protection, data privacy, and cybersecurity oversight.
This would position Ghana as a trusted digital finance hub capable of attracting investment, scaling fintech exports, and enabling regional payment interoperability within ECOWAS.
The consensus from the discussion was clear: Ghana’s fintech growth depends on a unified open banking API framework supported by national standards, regulatory coordination, and real-time settlements.
