10th Ghana CEO Summit | (28-05-2026)

Added: 2026-05-30

[00:00:00]so that businesses that are complying stop paying the implicit subsidy for those who are not. This way the revenue this country can't pardon me. This way the revenue this country needs should come from a wider fairer base rather than a deeper cut into the same ones.

[00:00:24]Second which refer to as capability resonates with the governor's point on technology and innovation.

[00:00:31]The second proposition which is technology renovation will form a bedrock to structurally change our institution and the efficiency with which we collect taxes. Historically, the capacity of the state to administer tax has been constrained by the limits of manual systems. And in every one of these manual touch points, the same problems have repeated themselves.

[00:00:59]Subjectivity, dispute, delay, and opportunity for leakage. This is not a specifically a Ghanaian problem. It is a feature or how nearly every African tax administration operates and is binding constraints on our technological renovation.

[00:01:19]These constraints have to be broken by technology. modern tax administration platforms and systems and the ability to integrate data across previously siloed databases have collapsed and therefore we are breaking the bounds of reforms to improve efficiency through the use of technology and want to note that technological use is not about only incremental improvement on our old job.

[00:01:48]It is the ability to do more, to do it faster and to be better.

[00:01:54]In this respect, we are on a journey to modernize our tax administration systems relying on technology as enabler. And let me give a few examples. As part of our customs modernization and as many of you are aware, we have introduced the AI publican software as a digital inspection decision support tool. Your excellency, we thank you for your support. We want to claim that GRE publicly is the first public institution to use AI across board affecting many businesses.

[00:02:32]The purpose is to reduce discretion, make faster assessment, create a fairer basis for all import basis for all import assessment.

[00:02:44]Indeed, your excellency, the results for the first two months of deploying the AI is amazing and promising. In the month of April alone, we added 1 billion to our revenue generation for customs. And your excellency, we are on course in the month of May at the results as yesterday is showing that we are going beyond 1 billion for the month of May.

[00:03:11]Second, our integrated tax administration system is here. For many years, we've operated on a domestic system which is challenging.

[00:03:21]This was a 2-year project conceived in 2021 with a deadline of completion in 2023.

[00:03:29]Apologetically, we failed.

[00:03:31]The deadline was moved to 2024 December and again we failed. Your Excellency, I'm happy to announce that under your leadership within 9 months, we have completed the ITAS project, resurrected it, and we launch it on 1st April 2026.

[00:03:54]So, ITAS went live in April as a limited pilot at our crow west and Kaneshi area.

[00:04:02]In the month of May, we are on boarding all the large taxpayers on ITAS and by the middle of June taxpay 25% of our tax basket will be on this new reform on this new platform. The mechanics under the surface matters because that is where the value of your businesses come from. ITAS is a simple platform onto which we are integrating data that has historically lived in fragmented systems. Itas will integrate with the register of companies and restaurant general's department. As you register a business automatically you'll be in the GS system. ITAS will integrate with SNIT. So for those who pay SNIT pension is important but do not pay taxes so we can build the roads and schools. it will help us find you. We are integrating with national identification authority. So again for individuals and the modified taxation we are able to see that ITAS will integrate with the passports authority. We found so many Ghanaians with assets and income outside the country and we see that you register with your passport actually when you're opening the accounts. So at will help us find you. It's simple. If you have paid the taxes in those countries, no problem. If you haven't paid and you need to pay something in Ghana, you will help us to pay a little quarter. So, I'm sure last year we wrote to about thousand of our high net worth.

[00:05:38]So, if you receive it, it's a friendly conversation. We thank you for paying, but we'll increase the number going forward.

[00:05:46]So, you see that going forward data is a key in our technology drive to find those who are paying and who are not. So when you see a tax auditor who arrives at your doorsteps, it is because data warrant it. It is not because someone happened to pull a file. And this is the way we are going. Your excellency, this is what we mean. Your excellency when we say we are building a tax system that also fits the 24-hour economy. The system itself has to operate at the 24-hour tempo. Itas is what enables us to do that. Therefore, I call on you cos and business executives in this room with your finance team and your advisers to understand ITAS to embrace it and let's work through the change together so that we can collectively raise the necessary revenue. Of course, there are other technological modernizations that is coming today for our VAT. We know that for every 10 businesses only four are paying the VAT. The six either have not registered or they have registered and and not collecting or they registered collecting and not remitting to GRE. By the third quarter of this year, we going to implement the fiscal and electronic devices act which will make it mandatory for all businesses to use government approved devices so that as you sell we are able to see the revenue and look at government one. But not only that, what is it? What is it for? What is need for businesses? For those who are afraid to leave your businesses and and always you have to be in the shop. The J system will help you.

[00:07:30]You don't need to be there. When you make the sales, you get the record. So no longer will your people steal from you. All of us will see from one view and you pay your taxes and we protect your income for you. I think you should present this clap and support you.

[00:07:49]So the fair system is coming. It will revolutionize VAT and will help us increase our tax revenue and uh my de Lord uh uh uh brother has you said we should improve the revenue. We're looking forward for your support. The second area is the online online businesses. So again by the third quarter of this year we are introducing a system. What we've seen is that there's a growing number of taxpayers who are buying cross border outside the country and yet their colleagues who are buying in country they pay the VAT on those items. Your excellency we've done a pilot and if you have introduced the system in 2025 we would have increased tax revenue additional of 2.5 billion.

[00:08:37]So your excellency again with your support we are implementing this system that will ensure that as you buy online you pay your VAT and gradually also move into the digital and crypto assets.

[00:08:50]We've seen a lot of people making a lot of money in crypto. So after the VAT please expect us we are coming there.

[00:09:00]The combined effect of our modernization efficiency is of operations the use of data to drive decisions enhance our revenue uh mobilization.

[00:09:12]So that brings me to the third proposition which is productive economy and I want to shorten it by saying that in this situation as businesses grows and we all work together as partnership both the government both GR and businesses as you grow we thrive together to support you in driving your businesses and ensure that uh as the pie grows we can also grow. Please permit me let make this important point. The fourth which is sovereignty. So Ghana has spent decades closing the gap between what we produce and what we want to fund through external development financing.

[00:09:51]That arrangement has supported rare progress and I do not want to be dismissive of it but it is closing.

[00:09:58]Bilateral budget support has fallen sharply across the continent. The conditiones attached to multinational lending have grown heavier. The development financing envelope that this country could draw upon for differences between domestic revenue and national ambition in rare terms is shrinking. We see this in our numbers. The choice that we have is binary. Either we mobilize enough domestic revenue to fund the country or we say we will borrow. But we know borrowing is not available to us.

[00:10:30]And therefore the option available to us is together raise the national domestic revenue to support development agenda. In conclusion, President revenue mobilization, tax reforms, digital compliance, the three strands of the topic this morning are not only three administrative goals that are running par. They are expressions of a single argument about how Ghana built its fiscal foundation and what that foundation enables. Fairness because it is a low compliance economy. The compliant business carries a shared burden. Capacity and capability because technology has finally enabled us to close the gap. Sovereignty we don't have a choice. We must raise this revenue in this direction. Your excellency G's ambition is that by 2028 we should double the tax revenue that of as of 2024 in 2024 the tax reported revenue was 153 billion your excellency under your leadership we expecting by by 2028 will double that to over 310 billion this is the way to go and your excellency we are on course in 2025 We achieved 182 billion in 2026. We are focused to raise 225 billion. We believe that this minimum target is achievable and we crave on all of you to support us. So this is not the bet. This is the work we must do and that is the partnership we are asking each of you this morning to forge with us so that together we can embrace collectively the responsibility of honoring our tax obligations to mobilize revenue for our collective national development.

[00:12:26]Chairman your student stands here. Thank you your excellency. Thank you ladies and gentlemen. Thank you ladies and gentlemen. It's official today. No tax. Put your hands together.

[00:12:44]Mr. Anthony Safo, Commissioner General of GR. Thank you very much for that very insightful talk.

[00:12:58]Meet at a fisherman. He doesn't know it yet. But today his life will change.

[00:13:04]Like any other day, he begins with hope.

[00:13:08]He stakes lotto, buys premixed fuel, and prepares for the next catch. But not today, because his wife is in labor. As he races to her side, worry fills his mind.

[00:13:25]>> Not just for her and the baby, but for their future. It's a boy. And when he finally sees them, he remembers that everything will be all right. He remembers the numbers he staked and that maybe, just maybe, today the odds will be in his favor. He remembers that life has become easier thanks to the use OF TECHNOLOGY.

[00:13:47]WITH every life we touch and every dream we ignite, KGL stands as a beacon of possibility, empowering communities, transforming futures, and shaping a world where hope and opportunity knows no bounds. KGL Group, innovate, connect, inspire.

[00:14:09]The governor of the Bank of Ghana alludes to the private sector in being a critical mass in driving Ghana's economic transformation from vision to action. If your voice is yours, let me hear you say leadership, resilience, industrial scale.

[00:14:26]What do all these themes have in common?

[00:14:28]Well, they speak to how we can raise African champions. And for the next few minutes, Mr. President, ladies and gentlemen, we're going to talk on leadership, resilience, and industrial scale lessons from Ghana's business transformation. Who better the executive chairman of the KGL group, Mr. Alex Apo?

[00:15:19]I I was just reminding him that I've been given 15 minutes, so you shouldn't come and hound me around there.

[00:15:28]Your Excellency the President of the Republic, President John Bramani Mama, Honorable Minister, Chairman of the Occasion, Captains of Industry, distinguished business leaders, members of the diplomatic CP, development partners, ladies and gentlemen.

[00:15:50]It is indeed a great honor and a privilege to address this distinguished gathering on an issue that will define the economic future of our continent is how do we build African business champions capable of competing globally while transforming our economies.

[00:16:14]Africa can no longer afford to remain the greatest promise.

[00:16:22]Time has come for Africa to become one of the world's greatest producers of institutions, industrial champions, innovation, and economic power.

[00:16:35]Permit me, your excellency, to address you today or this gathering today, not merely from a standpoint of theory, but from the practical realities of building businesses across different markets, economies and business cycles over the past three decades.

[00:16:55]During these periods, I have experienced growth, uncertainty, disruption, resistance, transformation at firsthand.

[00:17:06]And it it is from that lived experience that I speak today about the urgent need for Africa to intentionally raise globally competitive champions.

[00:17:19]There comes a defining moment in the journey of every nation and every continent when it must confront a fundamental question. Are we con are we content with merely participating in the global economy or we are prepared to build the African or Ghanaian institutions, enterprises and business champions capable of competing globally while transforming our economies locally.

[00:17:48]Your Excellency, I believe Ghana and indeed Africa has arrived at that moment. For decades, Africa has been described as a continent of potential, a continent of rich natural resources, youthful energy, entrepreneurial spirit, creativity, and untapped opportunity.

[00:18:09]Yet, despite all these promises, the defining question of our time is no longer whether Africa has potential. The real question is whether we are building the kind of leadership culture, transgenerational businesses, industrial capacity, governance systems capable of transforming that potential into global competitiveness and long-term economic influence.

[00:18:34]The truth is natural resources and population size does not transform nations.

[00:18:42]potential alone has never transformed any nation. Institutions do.

[00:18:49]What Africa and Ghana must now produce your excellency is intentional intentionally and at scale are enduring institutions because throughout history every major economic transformation has been driven by strong indigenous enterprises.

[00:19:10]Your Excellency, Asia built industrial giants. Europe built manufacturing powerhouses. America built global corporations that became engines of innovation, influence, and national competitiveness.

[00:19:27]Africa must now build its own champions.

[00:19:31]Not merely CEOs.

[00:19:33]A CEO manages an enterprise or a company.

[00:19:37]But a business champion transform an economy. A distin the distinction is important.

[00:19:44]The evolution of transformational leadership in Africa is often started by being an entrepreneur, then a CEO, then an institutional builder, then you become a business champion. The final stage of business champion is where private enterprise becomes a force for continental transformation, driving innovation, scaling across borders value within Africa and contributing meaningfully to national development.

[00:20:17]Your Excellency, allow me to briefly share my experience or that of KGL group. Like many Africans of my generation, I built much of my professional and entrepreneurial career and wealth abroad, spending nearly three decades operating at a top level of corporate UK.

[00:20:38]But at some point, conviction became stronger than comfort. I returned to Ghana not because I didn't like the comfort of the United Kingdom. I returned to Ghana because I believe that Africanowned enterprises could build worldclass institutions powered by technology, governance, disciplined execution and long-term strategic vision where others where others saw adversity in a difficult operating environment in Ghana and in Africa. We saw opportunity.

[00:21:16]We built with long-term vision. We invested in systems. We prioritized governance. And we embraced technology not merely as a tool but at as a strategic enabler of scale.

[00:21:31]There were moments when the easier option would have been to retreat and go back to the United Kingdom. But difficult environments do not build weak institutions. They reveal strong ones.

[00:21:47]What began as a Ghanaian enterprise with bold vision has steadily evolved into something much bigger. A truly African story of ambition, resilience, innovation, and continental transformation.

[00:22:00]Today our footprint extends beyond Ghana into more than 10 African markets including Kodiva, Nigeria, Liberia and with the help of your excellency we are in discussion with the Kenyan government to enter that market and we are grateful to you your excellency and in all these markets where we have used technologydriven solutions and these are helping modernize sectors of economies and strengthening operational efficiency.

[00:22:33]And this this is important because African champions are not built me are not built merely to operate across borders. They are built by solving African problems with African innovation.

[00:22:52]But perhaps even more importantly, we understood early that true continental transformation cannot happen if successful African enterprises only extract value.

[00:23:05]They must reinvest value into their ecosystem.

[00:23:10]That is why at KGL group of companies through our investment subsidiary KGL Capital has deliberately invested millions of dollars into startups, emerging enterprises and struggling businesses not only in Ghana and across Africa but even in the developed markets.

[00:23:28]Our journey reinforce a critical lesson.

[00:23:32]Building an African champion requires more than capital.

[00:23:36]requires resilience, institutional discipline and innovation. It requires governance, credibility.

[00:23:45]It also requires technological adaptation and above all it requires long-term strategic thinking.

[00:23:53]Like many indigenous Ghanaian and African enterprises, we confronted with the same thing.

[00:23:59]constrained to access of patient capital, regulatory complexities, infrastructural limitation and so on.

[00:24:07]Yet despite these challenges, our experience demonstrates that African enterprises can compete successfully when bold vision matched with disciplined execution and supported by enabling public policy.

[00:24:28]That doesn't mean there are no challenges. Your excellency, building an African champion, you would have a lot of challenges. Distinguished guests, permit me to speak candidly at this point about some of the challenges many business leaders face.

[00:24:45]As an indigenous company begin to scale, scrutiny naturally intensifies and rightly so. it should.

[00:24:55]But in some instances, scrutiny evolves into suspicion.

[00:24:59]Scale begins to be viewed not as a national asset to be strengthened, but as something to be contained.

[00:25:07]Business leaders are not asking for immunity. Your excellency, indigenous companies must comply with the law. Yes, they must do. They must pay taxes. Yes, they must do. as KGL. I think the commissioner general will bear with me. I promised your excellency at Quu that we were going to pay 150 million cities in taxes for one of our companies. Your excellency, we turned up. We paid 153 million.

[00:25:40]We will continue to support the system and we will be announcing another significant tax payment for the second company within the next couple of uh within the next month and your excellency will go through all the seven companies of the subsidiary and we make huge tax payments. So yes, businesses should pay taxes.

[00:26:06]Should they meet regulatory standards?

[00:26:08]Yes, they must meet regulatory standards. Should they be investigated?

[00:26:12]Yes, they must be investigated when there is cause.

[00:26:16]Accountability for us is not optional.

[00:26:19]It is foundational.

[00:26:21]But accountability must also be consistent. It must be predictable, proportionate, and institutionally mature.

[00:26:32]We must apply the same standards, the same patience and the same regulatory balance to indigenous enterprises as we do with the foreign for foreign multinationals.

[00:26:50]In many African economies, when a foreign enterprise faces operational difficulty, the instinct is to stabilize it because policy makers recognize that its collapse could negatively impact jobs, investment, and the broader economy. Yet when indigenous companies face challenges, the narrative can sometimes become advers adversarial be before the process concludes.

[00:27:21]Regulatory enforcement must never evolve into institutional hostility towards indigenous scale.

[00:27:30]If Ghana does not protect and nurture responsible indigenous enterprises, who will build the continental champions that we aspire to create?

[00:27:42]No nation has industrialized by undermining its own productive capacity.

[00:27:49]The economies we admire today regulate strongly, but they also protect strategic industries.

[00:27:59]They hold companies accountable, but they do not dismantle domestic champions lightly. They understand that scale is a national assets. In Ghana, we must develop that same institutional maturity.

[00:28:15]If an indigenous enterprise fails governance standard, we should correct it.

[00:28:21]If it breaches the law, we should hold it accountable.

[00:28:26]But if it is building responsibly, creating jobs, paying taxes, innovating and contributing to national growth, then we must protect its ability to scale. Thus, raising African champions requires more than an individual ambition. It requires institutional maturity. It requires policy coherence and it requires our collective understanding that sustainable skill benefits the nation not merely the founder.

[00:29:03]Distinguished guests, Africa's greatest deficit is not lack of ideas. Africa and Ghana does not suffer from a poverty of ambition. Two of it Africa suffers from inconsistency of execution.

[00:29:19]Infrastructure alone does not transform nations. Leadership does.

[00:29:25]Africa requires a new generation of leaders in business and government.

[00:29:33]Think beyond election cycles, beyond cotali profits and beyond narrow national interest. We need leaders prepared to build institutions.

[00:29:44]No transformation agenda can succeed where leaders fail.

[00:29:50]then brings me to my next topic which is quite important to myself and I I think it should be to most of the founders in in this room. Another of Africa's most under discussed economic challenge is the inability to institutionalize wealth to institutionalize wealth across generations.

[00:30:18]that I'm talking about family wealth and transgenerational enterprise. Too much African wealth disappears within one generation because it is con it is consumed rather than structured fragmented rather than institutionalized which means when we make the money we buy the cars and the buildings and all those slaughtered it disappears when Alex daddy passes on it all disappears and that is what African wealth is. No civilization advances sustainably when wealth disappears every generation.

[00:30:53]Yet globally, many of the world's most enduring corporations were built through disciplined family capital, succession planning, governance structures, and long-term reinvestment strategies.

[00:31:08]If Ghana is serious about building sustainable business champions, then family wealth must be viewed not merely as an inheritance which the family comes in and takes over but it should be viewed as an asset class for building transgenerational enterprises. So you just don't make money and think that it goes it goes to be inherited. founders of ours in in this room, those who have made a bit of wealth should look at wealth as an asset class to be reinvested in our communities. But this requires intentional investment, investment in family offices, investment in holding structures, governance systems, succession frameworks, and long-term capital redeployment into productive sectors of the economy. The future African business champion must not simply create wealth.

[00:32:11]He or she must transfer institutional memory, capability, values, productive capitals across generations.

[00:32:22]In conclusion, your excellency, let me leave us with one final thought.

[00:32:28]The mission before us is greater than any individual person or corporate success.

[00:32:38]Greater task is nation building through enterprise and raising and to build great African champions. Champions to create prosperity.

[00:32:52]Champions to empower young people.

[00:32:55]champions to strengthen institutions, drive innovation, scale across borders, build industrial capacity, and shape Africa's economic future.

[00:33:11]The Africa therefore sorry and this is the Africa that we intend to build. Thank you very much. May God bless our homeland Ghana and make our nation great and strong.

[00:33:35]And that's how we move from vision to action, raising African champions through leadership, resilience, and industrial scale. Mr. Lex Apad, executive chairman of the KTL group.

[00:33:46]Please, one more time, a round of applause.

[00:33:51]It's a new day for trade in Ghana and Africa. One certainly marked by value addition. Hence Ghana's Ministry for Trade, Agri Business and Industry.

[00:34:04]Please make welcome the sector minister, the Honorable Elizabeth Oasuari for her remarks.

[00:34:35]Thank you very much. on the happy note of a taxpayer volunteering to pay more.

[00:34:40]Your Excellency, the President of the Republic of Ghana, the chairperson for the occasion, Tugway Aphed the 14th, ministers of state, senior government officials, members of parliament, the governor of Bank of Ghana, members of the diplomatic CP, chief executives of state and private institutions, great captains of industry, development partner, partners, distinguished CEO, ladies and gentlemen, good day.

[00:35:17]When governments, men and women who invest, produce, employ, and take risk to grow this economy gather in one room.

[00:35:28]It is an occasion to listen carefully, speak frankly, and commit to practical steps. It is in that spirit that I'm honored to address the 10th Ghana CEO submit and expo in the distinguished presence of his excellency President John Rammani Mahama and our respected leaders of industry.

[00:35:49]Your Excellency, your presence here today following your recent engagement with members of the Chief Executive Network Ghana at Jubilee House signals a structured purposeful dialogue between government and the private sector is not optional but essential.

[00:36:08]I'm also here to commend the chief executive network Ghana for sustaining this platform for 10 years.

[00:36:16]A decade of conveying governments, CEOs, investors and policy makers is a meaningful and lasting contribution to Ghana's economic life. Your Excellency, under your visionary leadership, you have made it clear that Ghana's transformation will not come from exporting raw materials and importing finished goods at higher cost.

[00:36:40]Your administration has backed that conviction with action through bold initiatives such as feed the industry program which directly connects agricultural production to industrial demand ensuring that factories have reliable local raw materials rather than turning to costly imports. These deliberate policy choices are already beginning to shift the structure of our economy and my ministry is proud to be at the center of their implementation.

[00:37:13]Your excellency, this overarching theme of this summit calls on all of us to move from vision to action. And it is precisely within that call that I wish to situate the specific dimension I've been asked to address today. the role of leadership, technology, and industrialization as catalyst for Ghana's economic transformation.

[00:37:38]These I believe are practical levers that determine whether reform ambitions translate