How do payment switching licences map across African markets?
Payment switching is licensed under 12 local licence categories across 12 African markets — each normalized to the same canonical activity, so a licence in one market maps to its equivalent in another. Each market's local category name, regulator and source is below; local scope still differs, so the mapping is at the activity level, not word-for-word.
Regulators name this licence differently market by market: System Operator in South Africa, Opérateur de système de paiement monétique agréé (Licensed monetic payment-system operator) in DR Congo, Payment System Operator in Uganda, Payment System Operators in Rwanda, plus 5 more in the table below. The same authorization is asked about under other names too: payment switch or interoperability.
Maintained: this official source is re-checked on a weekly schedule — last checked 2026-08-04 · unchanged since the previous check.
“Payment switching” here is the normalized activity: Own or operate payment switching, routing, clearing or interoperability infrastructure between payment service providers, issuers, acquirers and schemes.
Activity id (as used by the Afriset MCP): fintech:SWITCHING
| Market | Local licence category | Regulator | Licensed | More |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kenya | To own, possess, operate, manage or control infrastructure for the provision of payment services | Central Bank of Kenya | 3 | who's licensed |
| Nigeria | Switching & Processing Licence Category | Central Bank of Nigeria | 19 | who's licensed |
| Rwanda | Payment System Operators | National Bank of Rwanda | 1 | who's licensed |
| Tanzania | Switching Service Provider | Bank of Tanzania | 0 | who's licensed |
| Uganda | Payment System Operator | Bank of Uganda | 9 | who's licensed |
| South Africa | System Operator | South African Reserve Bank | 99 | who's licensed |
| Zambia | Payment System Operator | Bank of Zambia | 0 | who's licensed |
| Ethiopia | Payment System Operator (Switch Operator) | National Bank of Ethiopia | 2 | who's licensed |
| Zimbabwe | Card switching / national payment switch | Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe | 4 | who's licensed |
| DR Congo | Opérateur de système de paiement monétique agréé | Banque Centrale du Congo | 0 | view register |
| Namibia | Payment System Operator | Bank of Namibia | 2 | who's licensed |
| Malawi | Payment System Operator | Reserve Bank of Malawi | 2 | who's licensed |
Why the mapping isn't word-for-word
Each regulator names and scopes its categories differently — that's exactly why Afriset normalizes them to canonical activities. Equivalence here is at the activity level: these are the licence categories in each market mapped to the same normalized activity. Local scope differences (caps, tiers, permitted operations) are recorded on each category's register page.
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