AFD challenges claim of mobile telephony boost in Cameroon

The French Development Agency (AFD) has revealed in its latest edition of the journal 'Common Knowledge', published in partnership with the University Agency Francophonie (AUF) and UNESCO the rate of mobile phone penetration in Cameroon in 2014. They stated a rise in mobile telephony at 36 percent, disputing the figure of 17 percent set by the Agency telecommunications regulator (ART).

Based on the statistics of the AFD, Cameroon peak behind African countries such as Botswana 75 percent, Mauritius 74 percent, Cote d'Ivoire 46 and Nigeria 42 percent.

The number provided by AFD is in total contradiction with that of the national regulator, which maintains that the mobile phone penetration rate rose from 9.8 percent in 2004 to 71 percent in 2014, an increase of 62 percent in the space of ten years.

However, ART had explained that this mobile penetration rate was calculated based on the number of cards SIM activated in the country and not on the basis of the total number of subscribers to mobile telephony in relation to the population.

According to experts, the AFD figures are not totally reliable, as far as, even making the comparison between the number of mobile subscribers, the rate of 36 percent would not hold in reality, since according to figures from the ART, 15 million people have a mobile phone in Cameroon out of a total population of 22 million.