The Chief Executive of Universal Merchant Bank, Dr. Philip Oti-Mensah, has called on the banking industry to deepen its deployment of artificial intelligence beyond isolated back-office functions, arguing that the sector has the use cases, the regulatory backing, and the talent pipeline to make the technology a genuine driver of transformation.
In remarks at the media launch of the 10th Ghana CEO Summit and Expo in Accra, Dr. Oti-Mensah said that the foundations for meaningful AI adoption were in place, but that institutions needed to commit to specific outcomes rather than broad ambitions.
He outlined credit scoring, fraud detection, and customer service transformation as the priority areas where banks should be measuring real results.
“Real change looks like identifying specific use cases, launching defined AI projects with timelines, investing in data infrastructure and talent, and measuring the outcomes,” he said.
The sector has been moving in that direction, if unevenly. According to the PwC Ghana Banking Survey 2025, 68 percent of bank CEOs reported some level of AI adoption, with measurable impact on revenue and profitability. Early gains from AI and generative AI deployment were credited with contributing to the sector’s strong 2025 results, including net interest income of GH¢28.65 billion and profit before tax of GH¢21.87 billion.
The policy environment is also becoming more supportive as the National Artificial Intelligence Strategy has received Cabinet approval and is scheduled for official launch on April 24, 2026, with the government describing it as a defining moment in the country’s digital transformation journey.
The Bank of Ghana has issued a regulatory framework outlining expectations for data governance, model risk, and cybersecurity, creating a more predictable environment for institutions looking to scale their deployments.
The opportunity is significant. A 2025 KPMG West Africa Banking Industry Customer Experience Survey, drawing on insights from over 35,000 retail customers and 5,000 small and medium enterprises across Ghana and Nigeria, found that strategically deployed AI could move the sector from reactive problem-solving to proactive service delivery.
PwC Ghana identified credit risk modelling, fraud detection, compliance, and customer engagement as the areas where banks were already seeing traction, with generative AI offering further potential to automate loan monitoring and personalise customer repayment plans. [
Dr. Oti-Mensah, added that UMB’s balance sheet had nearly tripled within a year under his leadership through disciplined execution and said that the variable separating leaders from laggards was institutional will.
“Leadership today is not about knowing what to do. It is about doing what we already know, consistently, courageously and completely,” he said.
The Ghana CEO Summit and Expo, now in its 10th edition, will be held on Thursday, May 28, 2026, under the theme: Accelerating Ghana’s Economic Transformation: ‘Driving Bold Reforms through Leadership, Technology, and Industrialization for Sustainable Growth’.
