FG targets 200 new telecom sites before December as Bosun Tijani outlines towers, fibre and a satellite upgrade for unserved areas

The Minister of Communications, Innovation and Digital Economy, Dr Bosun Tijani, said in Abuja on Monday, 14 September 2026, that the Federal Government expects at least 200 new telecommunications sites to be working before December as part of a drive to reach more than 20 million Nigerians now poorly served.

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Dr Tijani spoke at the commissioning of the new headquarters of the Nigeria Data Protection Commission. The FG targets 200 new telecom sites pledge sits inside a larger plan for 3,700 towers, aimed at underserved and unserved communities. “Before December, at least 200 of those sites will be active,” he said.

Each tower, he added, should serve settlements of about 5,000 to 10,000 people. “These are people that are currently unconnected. So, at the end of this project, we will be reaching over 20 million Nigerians.” He said President Bola Tinubu had directed that service be taken to places still off the digital map. The first tower under the programme stands in Kura Village, outside Abuja. Work has also begun in the Niger Delta.

The same speech sketched the rest of the stack. The government is putting money into a 90,000 kilometre fibre network. President Tinubu has approved an upgrade of Nigeria’s communications satellite so that NIGCOMSAT can cover ground where fibre and towers cannot. “For places where fibre cannot reach, where towers cannot reach, NIGCOMSAT will now be able to reach those locations,” Dr Tijani said.

He put the information and communications technology share of gross domestic product at about 21 per cent, up from 16 to 18 per cent at the start of the administration, and said 25 per cent should be the next aim. Extra users, he argued, need digital literacy, cybersecurity and data protection if the boom is not to leave people exposed.

That last point explained the venue. The National Commissioner and Chief Executive Officer of the NDPC, Vincent Olatunji, said the commission had licensed 356 Data Protection Compliance Organisations and helped create more than 27,000 jobs in three years.

Revenue over the same period exceeded N12bn, he said, while the wider privacy market was worth more than N18bn. A virtual privacy academy has onboarded more than 66,000 Nigerians, and more than 220 training programmes have reached 99,370 people.

The NDPC Head of People Management and Administration, Mrs Watira Fitto, called the new building a mark of institutional stability. The commission has moved four times in four years: from fewer than three rooms at NITDA, to about eight in Maitama, 26 in Asokoro, and now about 56 offices in Mbora District.

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The December target is a checkpoint, not the finished network. Two hundred live sites would be a start on 3,700 towers. Whether rural signal follows the speech will be measured in Kura, the Delta and the other quiet places the minister says are still unconnected.