President Bola Tinubu has released an official gazette designating telecom infrastructure as critical national information infrastructure and making it a criminal offence for anyone to wilfully destroy such infrastructure in the country.
The Minister of Communications, Innovation and Digital Economy, Dr. Bosun Tijani disclosed this on Wednesday.
According to him, the gazette, ‘Designation and Protection of Critical National Information Infrastructure Order, 2024’, is a significant step that would strengthen and protect investments in the ICT sector by reducing incidences capable of damaging the operations and functionality of the country’s technological systems, infrastructure, and networks.
While thanking the President for releasing the official gazette, Tijani said the security and protection of the Critical National Information Infrastructure (CNII) is a priority for the administration.
Criminal offence
The Minister added that designating telecom infrastructure as CNIIand would help improve the quality of telecoms services, which has often been affected by disruption and intentional damage.
“This gazette now makes it an offence to wilfully damage assets such as telco towers/sites, switch stations, data centres, satellite infrastructure, submarine & fibre optic cables, transmission equipment, e-government platforms, databases among many others,” he said.
Tijani said the government would continue to work to create an enabling and supportive environment and policies for the digital economy to thrive.
Backstory
Over the years, stakeholders in the Nigerian ICT sector have been calling on the government to designate telecom infrastructure as a critical national asset to address the persistent attacks on the infrastructure across the country.
- In March this year, the Chairman of the Association of Licensed Telecommunications Operators of Nigeria, Gbenga Adebayo, reiterated the call as Nigeria suffered an internet outage due to damage to some fibre optic cables.
- In 2023 alone, MTN Nigeria said it suffered more than 6,000 cuts on its fiber cable. The operator relocated 2,500 kilometres of vulnerable fiber cables between 2022 and 2023, at a cost of more than N11bn —enough to build 870 kilometres of new fiber lines in areas without coverage.
- Earlier this month, the Chief Executive Officer of Airtel Nigeria, Carl Cruz, while speaking during an industry forum, said the telecom company has been recording an average of 1,000 cases of fibre cuts every month.
What you should know
Meanwhile, the designation of telecom infrastructure as a critical national asset may not address the challenge except the government shows the political will to enforce the Order.
In June 2020, the immediate past Minister of Communications, Dr. Isa Panatami announced a similar action by former President Muhammadu Buhari.
According to Pantami, Buhari approved and also directed that necessary physical protective measures be put in place to safeguard telecommunications infrastructure deployed across the country.
With the presidential directive, the Minister said the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA), Defence Headquarters (DHQ), Nigeria Police Force (NPF), Department of State Security Services (DSS), and the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC), had been notified of the President’s directive and are expected to enforce same as directed.
However, this failed to have any impact as vandalism of the infrastructure has remained a daily occurrence across the country to date.