Assistance to customers as FG memo 5% levy to calls, data

Deputy Chairperson of the Nigeria Communication Commission (NCC), Dr. Aminu Maida, has confirmed that the President of Bola Tinubu has abolished the five percent excise tax on telecommunications services, the policy reversal that is expected to ease the cost pressure on millions of customers.

Speaking during an interactive session with a journalist in Abuja on Tuesday, Maida revealed that the levy, which had previously been suspended, has now been fully deleted under new tax reform.

“Customs, about five percent or more, there are no more,” said Maida. “Previously, it was suspended, but now the president is generous to delete it completely. I was in the room when it was raised, and he said, no, we could not put this on the Nigerians. I was very happy when the bill came out, and we saw the words followed.”

This task was first introduced in 2022 under the administration of the former President of Muhammadu Buhari but immediately received criticism from industrial stakeholders and consumer supporters, who argued that it would worsen the cost of living and hamper growth in the telecommunications sector. The tax was suspended in July 2023 by President Tinubu while waiting for a review.

The five percent levy is embedded in the fiscal law entitled “Bill for Actions to withdraw Certain Actions on Taxation and Consolidate Legal Framework related to Taxation and impose Nigerian tax laws to provide taxation, transactions, and instruments, and related problems.”

Maida described the abolition of final tax as a victory for consumers and industry, noting that the telecommunications sector remains the center of Nigerian economic activity and digital inclusion agenda.

He described the ongoing NCC reform designed to strengthen consumer transparency and protection. Among these are the Public Map of Network Performance, which is expected in September, which will display independent data on the speed of download, latency, and other service quality indicators. The commission will also release a quarterly performance report using user data to expand accountability to infrastructure operators and providers.

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“Transparent companies, which are well regulated, attract investment and perform better,” said Maida, added that corporate governance and accountability will be used to build a global competitive telecommunications brand, owned by Nigeria.

The NCC BOS further highlighted the main sectoral reform, including conclusions from the Nin-SIM audit, the resolution of the USSD debt dispute, the transition to the final user billing, and the launch of a large incident reporting portal. He stressed the need to update the Nigerian national telecommunications policy, which was last revised in 2000, to reflect the current digital economy reality.

“In the early 2000s, this was about sound and text. Today, this is about internet connectivity and technology that arises: artificial intelligence, internet things, long distance sensors, augmented reality. The policy does not fail, but we must develop for new reality,” he said.

In complaints of continuous data depletion, Maida said that the NCC-CBN task force jointly introduced a new framework to standardize the refilling process. He revealed that an independent audit by the Tier-1 company did not find systemic manipulation of consumer data by the operator, instead referring to factors such as background application activities, device settings and tariff complexity.

“We don’t try to punish anyone,” he explained. “We want the industry to grow, so that consumers are happier, operators perform better, and the government gets benefits from a broader tax base.”

Director of the NCC Consumer Affairs Bureau, Freda Bruce-Bennett, also discussed the session, offering practical tips for customers to manage data usage. This includes deactivating autoplay on social media, limiting background data, deleting un use applications, activating data saving modes and prioritizing Wi-Fi connections.

According to NCC statistics, Nigeria currently has 172 million active telephone customers, of which 141 million are internet users, representing 81.9 percent of the total, while broadband users are 105 million.

The Director of Public Affairs, Nnenna Ukoha, praised the role of the media in communicating regulatory efforts, urged stronger collaboration. “You are people who send and convey our transformative policies to Nigerians,” he said. “Therefore, I invite you to open and talk to us freely. We are here to collaborate with you.”