NIA boss confirms integration of 191 financial institutions

Ghanaian

Prof. Kenneth Attafuah, the Executive Secretary of the National Identification Authority (NIA), has confirmed that 191 financial institutions, including Universal Banks, Rural Banks, and Savings and Loan companies, have successfully been integrated into its data system.

He disclosed this during an interview on the Citi Breakfast Show.

According to him, this integration has proven instrumental in facilitating efficient identity

Read full articleverification for clients, enabling seamless fund transfers from bank accounts to mobile money wallets.

Prof. Attafuah confirmed that the shared information encompasses crucial details such as names, birth dates, gender, and nationality, leaving no room for inconsistencies.

This comes in response to complaints regarding fees associated with transferring money between bank accounts and mobile money wallets, especially when sharing the same details. John Awuah, the head of the Ghana Association of Bankers, previously attributed these fees to discrepancies in Ghana Card details between mobile money and bank accounts.

“I can tell you that the Bank of Ghana, all 24 universal banks in the country, 145 rural banks in Ghana some savings and loans companies, about eight of them and some centres, approximately 14 have been onboarded unto the NIA’s personal verification system platform enabling these institutions to verify the identities of persons who transact business for them in real-time,” Prof. Attafuah said.

He added that “as agreed with their regulator that is the Central Bank, we give them personal information that a client is required to give for KYC [Know-your-customer] and in fulfilment of the bank’s anti-money laundering rule. So the personal information that we give includes the surname, the first name, the previous name, date of birth, gender, nationality, residential address, digital address code and telephone number.”