Mahama Ayariga has put the potential value of Ghana’s property-rate base at close to GH¢20 billion a year, but efforts to capture that revenue face a familiar problem: a previous centralised digital collection system was followed by sharp falls in receipts at several assemblies.
Mahama Ayariga, nominated as Minister for Local Government, Chieftaincy and Religious Affairs, told Parliament’s Appointments Committee during his vetting that Metropolitan, Municipal and District Assemblies (MMDAs) could be collecting close to GH¢20 billion annually from property rates alone, based on what he described as conservative estimates.
“The potential exists at that level; it is not being collected,” Ayariga said, arguing that the revenue gap reflects weaknesses in the way assemblies currently identify, value and collect property rates.
He said the potential was being lost because assemblies struggled to enforce collections, particularly where political, traditional and personal relationships could make it difficult for District Chief Executives (DCE) and other local officials to pursue powerful property owners.
“When you ask the DCE to go to the chief’s house and collect property rates, I’m sure he will think that you are passing a death sentence on him,” Ayariga said.
He proposed a system that would be “totally digital” in identifying and valuing properties, collecting payments and distributing the resulting revenue.
The proposal, however, comes after Ghana’s previous attempt at a centralised digital property-rate system produced a sharp decline in collections at some assemblies and was eventually suspended.
The Unified Common Property Rate Platform, introduced in 2023 through a partnership between the Ghana Revenue Authority and the MMDAs, was designed to eliminate cash handling, automate billing and allow property owners to pay electronically. The government reported that the number of billable properties increased from 1.3 million before the reform to 12.42 million under the new system.
But the increase in the number of properties identified did not translate into comparable improvements in money reaching assemblies.
The decline was evident across several assemblies. According to a report by The Fourth Estate, the Accra Metropolitan Assembly’s property-rate revenue fell from about GH¢3 million in 2022 to GH¢1.3 million in 2023 after the centralised system was introduced. At the Adentan Municipal Assembly, collections also dropped from GH¢3.5 million in 2022 to GH¢1.4 million in 2023.
The government subsequently acknowledged that the reform had encountered difficulties that made it hard for MMDAs to access their share of the collections and announced that districts would resume collection while the system was reviewed.
The previous experience shows that digitisation alone does not solve the underlying revenue problem.
A recent investigation by The Fourth Estate found that revenues fell sharply across several assemblies after the centralised system was introduced. Officials also complained that they did not receive sufficient information on collections made on their behalf, making it difficult to reconcile accounts and determine outstanding liabilities.
The contrast is particularly relevant because some assemblies have demonstrated that digital collection can work when it is designed around their own operations.
The Korle Klottey Municipal Assembly, for example, reported that property-rate revenue rose to GH¢12.3 million in 2024 after introducing its own revenue collection system.
That suggests the issue may not be whether Ghana should digitise property-rate collection, but how the technology is designed, who controls the data, how payments are reconciled, and how closely the system is integrated with the assemblies that understand the properties and ratepayers within their jurisdictions.
Ayariga’s comments also point to the political economy of local revenue mobilisation. A centralised system could reduce the discretion of local officials and make it harder for political or personal relationships to influence who is pursued for payment.
But the previous experience shows that removing collectors from the process and moving the system to a central platform can create a different set of risks if local authorities lose visibility over their taxpayers and collections.
The lesson for the incoming minister is that any new digital property-rate system should not be rolled out simply as a technology project. It will require structured consultation with MMDAs, property owners, valuation authorities, revenue experts and technology providers before implementation.
The previous reform itself attracted concerns from assembly officials about centralisation and inadequate consultation. A new system should therefore establish clear rules for property valuation, data ownership, billing, reconciliation, revenue-sharing and the timing of transfers to assemblies before it goes nationwide.
For Mahama Ayariga, the opportunity is substantial. But if the government is to turn the property-rate base into a meaningful source of local fiscal revenue, the next digital reform will need to preserve the efficiency of electronic payments without repeating the collection and accountability problems that forced the previous system back to the assemblies.
