Ghana’s telecom regulator opened bidding for eleven 5G spectrum lots, charging MTN forty percent more per lot to prevent a repeat of a 2015 auction that shut out competitors.
The National Communications Authority (NCA) is offering three lots in the 700 MHz band, five in the 2.3 GHz band and three in the 3 GHz mid band. Applicants must pay a nonrefundable fee of GHS300,000 per lot, and sealed bids are due at the NCA Director-General’s office by 5pm on August 6.
MTN Ghana will pay the premium in two of the three bands because regulators classify it as holding significant market power. A 700 MHz lot costs other bidders $36 million, but MTN pays $50.4 million. A 3 GHz lot runs $24 million for competitors and $33.6 million for MTN. The 2.3 GHz band carries no premium, though MTN cannot bid there at all since it already holds similar spectrum acquired from Goldkey and Blue Telecoms.
The pricing structure responds directly to a mistake regulators made in 2015, when the NCA set an 800 MHz lot at $67.5 million, a price so steep that only MTN could afford to buy in, leaving the rest of that spectrum unsold. Ghana’s telecom market has shrunk from six competitive carriers to three since then, and MTN’s share has grown from 61 percent in 2022 to nearly 79 percent today, a level of dominance both the NCA and the Communications Ministry have publicly called a concern.
The new auction follows the NCA’s decision to strip Next Gen Infraco of the ten year wholesale 5G exclusivity it received in 2024. The company built only 43 to 49 sites against an eventual target near 1,200 and fell behind on a large share of its $125 million licence fee, prompting regulators to open the market rather than wait out the arrangement.
Winning bidders get fifteen year licences and must cover 70 percent of Ghana’s population with outdoor mobile broadband by March 6, 2027, timed to the country’s 70th independence anniversary. GSMA Intelligence has projected Ghana could reach only about 7 percent 5G coverage by the end of this year if commercial service launches soon, trailing Nigeria’s 22 percent, Kenya’s 38 percent and South Africa’s more than 60 percent.
MTN Ghana chief executive Stephen Blewett and Telecel Group chief executive Moh Damush have both said their companies intend to bid once the process opens.
