Meaningful connectivity is at the heart of Nigeria’s next digital frontier, says NCC’s Aminu Maida
With over 80 per cent network coverage across the country, Nigeria’s next priority for the digital economy is to achieve meaningful connectivity, which translates into improved productivity, stronger industries, and inclusive economic growth, Aminu Maida, executive vice chairman and chief executive officer of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), has stated.
With over 80 per cent network coverage across the country, Nigeria’s next priority for the digital economy is to achieve meaningful connectivity, which translates into improved productivity, stronger industries, and inclusive economic growth, Aminu Maida, executive vice chairman and chief executive officer of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), has stated.
Speaking during a fireside conversation on Technology, Wellbeing and Workforce Productivity at the 14th edition of BusinessDay CEO Forum 2026, themed from ‘From Stability to Shared Prosperity,’ Maida affirmed that the future of Nigeria’s digital economy will no longer be measured by subscriber numbers or broadband statistics, but by how effectively technology transforms healthcare, manufacturing, agriculture, education and other productive sectors.
“The next frontier is not necessarily about counting statistics,” he said. “It is about asking what Nigerians are actually doing with that connectivity.”
He argued that Nigeria’s digital policy requires a broader shift from just expanding access to leveraging digital infrastructure as an engine for national competitiveness.
Maida traced the country’s telecommunications journey to the National Telecommunications Policy of 2000, which liberalised the sector and transformed a market that once had fewer than 500,000 connected telephone lines into one with more than 180 million active connections today.
While describing the sector’s progress as remarkable, he argued that connectivity alone is no longer sufficient.
“Digital transformation is not about creating another industry,” he said. “It is about transforming existing industries.”
For Nigeria to unlock the full value of its digital economy, he said, we must prioritize the expansion of its digital infrastructure footprint, beyond deployment to urban centres in a way that supports businesses and public services across the country.
Although broadband coverage has reached much of the country and penetration continues to improve, Maida said Nigeria must now invest aggressively in data centres, fibre infrastructure and high-quality broadband capable of supporting increasingly data-intensive applications.
He observed that the overwhelming majority of the country’s data centres remain concentrated in Lagos, creating geographical imbalances that must be addressed as demand for cloud computing, artificial intelligence and data localisation accelerates.
Beyond constructing new infrastructure, he emphasised the importance of unlocking greater value from existing assets.
“Nigeria already possesses fibre infrastructure across every state,” he noted. “The challenge lies in creating transparent commercial frameworks that allow operators to access backbone infrastructure fairly and competitively.”
According to Maida, the NCC is undertaking a Wholesale d Market Assessment that will better understand the structure and competitiveness of Nigeria’s fixed broadband market, with an objective to identify practical measures that encourage investment, promote fair competition, improve infrastructure sharing, and support open access, thus enabling more internet service providers and digital infrastructure companies to expand into underserved regions.
Without such reforms, he warned, infrastructure owners naturally retain competitive advantages by limiting access, reducing market competition and slowing investment in new locations. Competition, he argued, remains the single most effective mechanism for improving affordability.
“Lagos enjoys relatively lower affordability gaps because consumers have alternatives,” he said. “Our goal is to create similar competitive conditions across the country.”
As Nigeria’s telecommunications regulator positions the sector to accommodate the rapid emergence of artificial intelligence, cloud services and advanced digital applications, sustaining that momentum depends on maintaining investor confidence.
Maida stressed that transparent regulation, policy consistency and institutional independence remain fundamental to attracting long-term capital into Nigeria’s telecommunications sector. Following several years during which investment growth stagnated, recent reforms have begun reversing that trend.
He pointed to renewed capital expenditure by major industry operators as evidence that confidence is returning, with companies now investing heavily in expanding network capacity rather than merely maintaining existing infrastructure. Protecting those investments, he added, has become equally important.
Maida highlighted ongoing efforts to operationalise the Federal Government’s designation of telecommunications infrastructure as Critical National Information Infrastructure, describing it as a major step towards safeguarding assets that now underpin virtually every sector of the economy.
Alongside physical infrastructure protection, the NCC is strengthening cybersecurity across the industry through its newly launched Cyber Resilience Framework for the Nigerian Communications Sector (CRF-NCS) while working within Nigeria’s broader data protection regime to improve digital resilience. For Maida, however, technology infrastructure alone will not determine Nigeria’s success.
Equally important, he noted is developing a skilled workforce that is capable of driving digital transformation. In his remarks, he acknowledged that the migration of highly skilled technology professionals has intensified pressure on organisations across multiple sectors, making talent development an increasingly strategic priority.
Institutions such as the Digital Bridge Institute, he explained, are being repositioned to equip professionals with both technical expertise and broader regulatory and leadership capabilities required by a rapidly evolving digital economy.
He also cited the Federal Government’s Three Million Technical Talent (3MTT) programme as an important initiative for building Nigeria’s future digital workforce.
Artificial intelligence, he noted, will inevitably reshape employment by enabling fewer workers to perform tasks previously handled by much larger teams. Rather than viewing that transformation solely as a threat, Maida urged organisations to embrace continuous learning and workforce reskilling.
“The challenge is not simply what AI replaces,” he said. “It is how we prepare people to build, manage and improve these new technologies.”
Closing the conversation, Maida called for a whole-of-government approach to national reform, arguing that today’s complex economy demands integrated policymaking rather than isolated interventions.
“Two decades ago, telecommunications policy focused primarily on connecting people,” he observed. “Today, digital infrastructure connects governments, businesses, machines, industries and public services, making collaboration across ministries and regulators indispensable.”
