By Na’ankwat Dariem, Abuja.
Dr Isa Ali Pantami, Minister of Communications and Digital Economy,
The Nigerian Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy has said that the average cost of 1GB of data has reduced from the January 2020 cost of N1,000 to N487.18 in November, 2020.
In a statement by the Special Assistant to the Minister on Technical Assistant (Information Technology), Dr Femi Adeluyi, said that measures had been put in place to significantly reduce the average cost of data.
This was based on a Report by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) submitted to the Minister following the implementation of the directives.
According to the statement “The Minister had inaugurated a Committee that developed the Nigerian National Broadband Plan (2020-2025) on December 16, 2019.
The Plan was unveiled and launched by His Excellency, President Muhammadu Buhari, GCFR, on the March 19, 2020.
One of the goals of the Plan is to reduce the average cost of 1GB of data to a maximum of N390 by 2025. With the January 2020 baseline of N1,000 per GB, the maximum projected steady decrease for the end of each year was as follows: 2020 (N925), 2021 (N850), 2022 (N775), 2023 (N700), 2024 (N545) and 2025 (N390)”
Also,” In line with Dr Pantami’s commitment to under promise and over deliver, the measures have caused the current cost of data to reduce significantly beyond the December 2020 projection of N925. Based on the Report by NCC, the average cost of data as at November 2020 was N487.18, which amounts to 47.33 per cent lower than the projected value. The Report also indicates that the cost of data in November 2020 was less than 50 per cent of the cost of data in January 2020″
“The Federal Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy, through the NCC, will continue to ensure that consumers enjoy a price regime that supports fairness and is friendly to consumers. Policies are in place to ensure that operators adopt competitive pricing that eschews unjustifiable margins.
The general public may also wish to note that complaints about rapid data depletion are also being investigated”
“For more enquiries, the Honourable Minister has directed NCC to respond to all issues raised by Nigerians and customers.
“All hands will remain on deck to achieve the goals of the Broadband Plan as the Ministry supervises its implementation in line with the National Digital Economy Policy for a Digital Nigeria” the statement added”
