Tigo Ghana loses nearly one million subscribers in five months

Tigo Ghana, the first operator to start mobile telephony  in Ghana has lost nearly one million subscribers within five months from February to June 2011, according to data from the National Communications Authority (NCA).

The data on telephone subscribers in Ghana shows Tigo Ghana subscriber base dropping from 4,135,744 in February to 3,222,583 in June 2011, accounting for the loss of 913,191 subscribers.

According to the data, Expresso the only provider on CDMA technology also lost 6,631 subscribers. In February it had 226,921 subscribers, but in June that fell to 220, 290 subscribers.

The other three operators however, have gained subscribers during the same period.

MTN Ghana gained a total of 599,197 subscribers in the period, rising from 8,967,067 subscribers in February to 9,562,264 subscribers in June.

Vodafone Ghana also rose from a subscriber base of 2,881,215 in February to 3,426,095 in June, gaining 544,880 subscribers which puts it up as the second largest mobile operator after MTN.

The total number of Ghanaians that use mobile phones the data says stands at 18,319,564 in June. There are however, 280,711 fixed line subscribers.

The subscriber base for Vodafone Ghana’s fixed line service fell from 283,054 in February to 270,216 in June, a drop of 12,838 subscribers.

Airtel, the other fixed line provider however, made some gains. The company gained 47 subscribers to its fixed line service. In February it had 10,448 and in June the subscriber base stands at 10,495.

By the conditions of the licenses of the mobile operators, they are required to submit monthly reports to the NCA. The report includes information on numbers that were used to make calls in the last  three months. The requirement is one of the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) standards.

The information that the NCA used in the data, therefore was supplied by the phone companies, its officials have indicated.

By Emmanuel K. Dogbevi