MTN Group to invest $120 million in South Sudan

President of South Sudan Salva Kiir Mayardit, Ralph Mupita with their team (biztechafrica.com)

MTN has announced that it will be investing over $120m in capital expenditure in South Sudan over the next 3 years.

This was made known during a courtesy call on the President of South Sudan, Salva Kiir Mayardit by MTN Group Chairman, Mcebisi Jonas, and MTN Group President and CEO Ralph Mupita who were on a visit tour of the Southern & Eastern Africa region.

According to a brief statement posted on the group’s official LinkedIn platform, both officials discussed issues of mutual interest, including investment in digital infrastructure and services.

MTN South Sudan recently received approval from the South Sudanese government to begin Mobile Money operations in South Sudan.

MTN Group was adjudged for the second year in a row, the most valuable African brand in the Brand Finance Africa 150 rankings, which assigned the group a brand value of US$2.7 billion – US$1.0 billion above the next most valuable brand.

A report on the 2021 survey’s findings states that “the telecoms giant dominates on home soil too, this year holding onto its decade-long reign as South Africa’s most valuable brand”.

Brand value is defined as the “net economic benefit that a brand owner would achieve by licensing the brand in the open market”.

Brand Finance Africa said the value of the continent’s top 150 brands fell by a combined US$5.5 billion in 2021, largely because of the COVID-19 pandemic creating uncertainty and impacting brands’ ability to do business as usual. In 2020, it had assigned MTN a brand value of US$3.3 billion.