The federal government of Nigeria has projected a US$1.1 billion revenue from the 5G spectrum in 2023. Umar Danbatta, executive vice chairman of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), recently disclosed the figure at an interactive meeting organized by the Senate Finance Committee on the 2023-2025 medium-term expenditure framework and budget strategy papers.
According to Danbatta, the projections are based on recent NCC achievements, of which most of the revenues will be generated from 5G auctions and tender processes in 2023.
Danbatta further revealed that NCC generated US$731 million in the second quarter of 2022 compared to US$590 million in the previous quarter.
“The increased revenue was achieved because MTN and Mafab Communications settled the financial obligations related to the 5G spectrum they won in December. As a result, each of the two companies disbursed the sum of US$273.6 million,” Danbatta explained.
Also commenting, Solomon Adeola, chairman of the Nigerian Senate Finance Committee, stated that the revenue projected by the NCC is expected to enable the government to reduce the projected deficit in the 2023 budget. The government’s projected expenditure for the 2023 fiscal year is US$45 billion, while its budget deficit is forecasted to be between US$25 billion and US$ 28 billion.
