UCC: 2.2m Mobile Money Accounts Deleted; Telecom Sector Revenue Grows 7% YOY

Telecom companies offering mobile money services conducted a clean-up exercise in which they deleted 2.2 million accounts, according to the communications sector report released by the Uganda Uganda Communications Commission (UCC), citing figures recorded at the end of March 2021.

"... following a clean-up of mobile network operators’ account registers, the number of active mobile money accounts was revised downwards, from 22.5 million to 20.3 million at the end of March 2021," reads the report published on July 14.

"On a year-on-year comparison, more than 5 million new accounts were registered between March 2020 and March 2021."

The report indicates that the growth was largely fuelled by significant fee waivers, increased merchant acceptance and limited movements at the height of the pandemic.

At continental level, the Commission says mobile money accounts had grown to 562 million at the end of March 2021.

The sector also saw growth in revenue, posting quarterly gross revenues over and above the 1 trillion mark, with Shs1.12 trillion recorded between January and March 2021.

"This reflects a 7% increase in gross revenue compared to the first quarter of 2020 when revenues stood at Shs1.05 trillion," reads the report.

"In terms of quarter-on-quarter comparison, industry revenues dropped by Shs20 billion from the previous record quarterly performance of Shs1.14 trillion in December 2020 to Shs1.12 trillion in March 2021."