Two phones or one phone? GRA’s confused posture
There is something almost absurd about being told that, as a traveller returning to Ghana, you should not bring more than two mobile phones into the country.
Almost. Because behind the humour is a much more serious question: how clear are the rules governing what a traveller may bring into Ghana, and how much discretion should an individual Customs officer have in deciding when personal belongings become commercial imports?
The Commissioner of the Customs Division of the Ghana Revenue Authority, Aaron Kanor, recently cautioned travellers against bringing more than two mobile phones into the country. According to him, a traveller may carry one phone for personal use, and perhaps another for a spouse, but anything beyond two could amount to commercial importation and attract duty. He particularly warned against the familiar Ghanaian practice of returning from abroad with phones collected from friends and relatives.
The logic is not difficult to understand. If one traveller arrives with seven brand-new iPhones, all belonging to different people, it is reasonable for Customs to ask questions. At some point, a suitcase ceases to look like personal baggage and begins to look like an informal import business. Customs has a legitimate responsibility to identify commercial goods, enforce the law and collect revenue that is properly due.
The problem, therefore, is not that Customs wants to enforce the rules. The problem is what happens when the rules are not sufficiently clear to the people expected to obey them.
GRA’s own published guidance says passengers must declare goods and baggage, and distinguishes personal effects from commercial goods. It says items qualifying as passenger baggage must be for the passenger’s use and not for sale or intended for other persons. Commercial goods, meanwhile, are to be channelled through the appropriate declaration process.
That is a reasonable framework. But the public announcement about two phones sounds considerably more categorical: two is acceptable; beyond two may be treated as commercial.
So what exactly happens with phone number three? Is it automatically commercial? Does the condition of the phone matter? Is a traveller carrying three old, used phones treated in exactly the same way as someone carrying three sealed, high-end smartphones? What if one belongs to the traveller, another is a work phone, and the third is a replacement for a damaged device? What if a husband is carrying his wife’s phone and his own? What if a mother is carrying a new phone purchased for her university-going child?
These are not attempts to help people evade Customs duties. They are perfectly ordinary questions in a system where certainty matters.
And this is where the discussion becomes bigger than mobile phones. For years, travellers have complained about stressful and sometimes intimidating encounters with officials at Ghana’s borders and airports. There have also been allegations of extortion. Those allegations should not be casually presented as established fact, and Customs officers should not be accused simply because they demand payment that is lawfully due. But neither should the experiences of travellers be dismissed.
Indeed, GRA’s own passenger guidance recognises the importance of accountability. It instructs passengers to declare their goods, use the appropriate channels and comply with examination procedures. The concern is what happens when a traveller does not know whether an officer is applying a clear rule, exercising legitimate discretion or simply interpreting the situation differently from the traveller. That uncertainty creates fertile ground for mistrust. And we have seen how quickly such mistrust can escalate.
In December 2025, a traveller alleged that he had been extorted at Kotoka International Airport after being charged more than GH¢12,000 in duty on 18 mobile phones and accessories. The GRA rejected the allegation, maintaining that the goods had not been declared, exceeded the applicable personal concession and had been processed through the formal Customs system, including the issuance of a Bill of Entry and receipt.
The important point is not who was right in that particular dispute. It is that a legitimate Customs assessment and an allegation of extortion can exist in the same public conversation when citizens do not have enough confidence in the process to know exactly what should happen.
That is dangerous for everyone. It is dangerous for the traveller, who may feel that he has no choice but to pay whatever figure is placed before him. It is dangerous for the honest Customs officer, whose legitimate enforcement action may immediately be viewed with suspicion. And it is dangerous for the institution itself, because every unclear rule increases the space in which mistrust and allegations can flourish.
GRA’s Customs Division says its responsibilities include revenue mobilisation, trade facilitation and public security, while its stated values include integrity and fairness. Those principles should be particularly visible at the airport, where the ordinary citizen is dealing directly with the power of the state. So if two phones is the practical threshold Customs intends to apply, publish it clearly. Explain precisely what it means. Explain whether the third phone is automatically regarded as commercial or merely triggers an assessment. Explain what factors Customs officers consider. Explain how the duty is calculated. Explain where and how payment should be made. Explain what documentation the traveller receives.
And, importantly, explain what a traveller can do if he or she disagrees with an assessment. There should be no need for a passenger to stand at an airport counter, exhausted after a long flight, trying to determine whether an unfamiliar demand is a lawful Customs assessment or something else. The airport should not be a classroom in which travellers discover the rules only after they have been stopped.
Ghana absolutely needs effective Customs enforcement. We cannot complain about revenue leakage on one hand and then object when Customs takes steps to identify commercial imports on the other. If someone is using travellers to bring substantial quantities of new electronics into Ghana for resale, Customs should intervene. But enforcement works best when the rules are predictable.
The answer to revenue mobilisation cannot be ambiguity. And the answer to allegations of extortion cannot simply be to tell travellers to trust the officer. Trust is built when the citizen knows the rule, understands the process and receives a transparent assessment.
Perhaps, then, the real issue is not whether a Ghanaian should travel home with two phones or three. It is whether, when that Ghanaian arrives at Kotoka, he knows what the state expects of him before he reaches the Customs desk.
A good Customs system should not merely be capable of collecting revenue. It should be capable of doing so without making the citizen feel that the rules are being invented at the airport.
That is the standard we should demand, not weaker Customs, but clearer Customs; not less enforcement, but less uncertainty; and not less revenue collection, but a system in which every cedi demanded can be explained, justified and accounted for. That is how you protect both the revenue and the reputation of the institution collecting it.
And frankly, that is how you stop phone number three from becoming a national controversy.
By: Baaba Hayfron
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