The Minister of Communication, Innovation and Digital Economy, Bosun Tijani on Tuesday explained that the 50% increase in telecommunication companies in the country was caused by inflation and rising operation costs.
He gave this explanation at the 2025 budget defence session by the joint House of Representatives and Senate Committees on Communication.
He added that the move was in tandem with broader economic patterns, where tariffs lead to higher consumer prices as a result of additional costs on imported goods adding that, tariffs act as a sales tax, causing a one-off price increase rather than sustained inflation.
Tijani, also disclosed that the Federal Government is planning to invest N6 six to deploy 90,000 Kilometres of Fiber Optic cable to expand the country’s capacity from 35,000 Kilometers to 125,000 kilometres
According to him, the planned deployment of more Fibre Optic cable is an initiative aimed at fostering growth in critical communication sectors in the country.
“Because outside of South Africa and maybe Egypt, perhaps Tunisia, a lot of countries have a serious deficit in cable. This is going to become a big business. We want Nigerian companies not only to lay in Nigeria but become companies that will provide these services for neighbouring countries as well.
“And we want our people to become the employees that will go out and do this work. We’ve seen more companies like South Africa being off the back of global business. They can now create security, but not only have to.
“So this is something we focus on. On security, we’ve seen a problem. You cannot secure a society if you don’t have strong communications.
“And what most people don’t pay attention to is that historically, we’ve left investment in telecommunications infrastructure to private companies. And these private companies will only go to where they can make money. In fact, they use a data set, which is called night-time satellite data, which will look down on the economy at night.
“And they will see where light exists, and that’s where they will put their money. Because those lights, for them, indicate economic activities
He added, “The ministry is underfunded. It’s not as funded as NCC. So the ministry, each time, they’re unable to actually track all the people that are using, all the people that are meant to pay on time.
“They don’t have the appropriate software to do the tracking. So because of this, they’re unable to spend the money. We know that this ministry, outside of the agency, can actually generate much more revenue if we have the resources to follow up on those things.
Responding, the Co-Chairman, Senate Committee on Communication, Senator Shuaib Salisu, highlighted the contribution of the communication sector to the economic growth of the nation.
He stressed the need to review the 2025 proposed budget of the ministry to enable it to deliver its mandate effectively and efficiently.
The committee consequently adopted a motion urging the Committees on Appropriation to consider an upward review of the ministry’s 2025 budget.
