Connecting Nigerians in Underserved Communites

Chiamaka Ozulumba reports on how MTN’s Rural Connectivity programme is connecting 20 million Nigerians in underserved communities

A report by the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), an affiliate of the United Nations, concerned with the functioning of global telecommunications, revealed that only 51 per cent of the world’s population was online as of 2019.

The organisation had freshly launched its facts and figures report titled Measuring Digital Development: Facts and figures 2020 report, where it estimated that only 51 per cent of the population were online as of 2019. This suggests that in a population of over 7 billion people, about 3.7 billion were without connectivity to the Internet.

This means that 3.7 billion people are denied the numerous opportunities that the internet provides. They are not allowed access to information available to all across the Internet. This figure was higher than the previously estimated figure of 3.6 billion, which was the figure given in the Measuring Digital Development: Facts and figures 2019 report.

This has been a worrisome affair among bodies and organisations tasked with connecting individuals across the globe, which is why companies with mandates to expand connectivity have been most noteworthy in recent times.

At its Annual General Meeting which took place on Monday, June 7, 2021, MTN announced that it was extending telecommunications coverage to millions living in underserved and unserved communities across Nigeria. This initiative is run under its rural telephony programme.

The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) had reported that there were still about 114 access gaps that would have housed about 30 million Nigerians. This meant that these 30 million Nigerians were without basic telephony service.

Recently, it was reported that there were 126,078,999 internet users in Nigeria in Q4 2019. The number of internet users in Nigeria increased by over 10 million between 2020 and 2021. Internet penetration in Nigeria stood at 50.0 per cent in January 2021 according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS). These new figures were largely due to initiatives such as MTN’s Rural Connectivity programme.

MTN also impacted the lives of 20 million Nigerians living in areas that do not have access or have little access to Internet coverage. This initiative, which was launched in 2020, kicked off as MTN identified more than 3,000 locations across Nigeria, where it would roll out coverage over the next three years.

Currently, more than 583 live rural sites have been installed across the country. More than half of these were installed in 2020, during the initial rollout. Some of these rural sites include Kurba in Bauchi State, Agbiyi Umuede in Abia State, Tobolo in Ogun state, Tudun Faila in Sokoto State, Uzo Uwani in Enugu state amongst many others.

Living up to its brand slogan ‘Everywhere you go’, MTN plans to install more than 1,000 new sites every year. Staying on course, the company hopes to have completed the full rollout at the end of 2022, covering all the locations it Identified.

“Together, we are deploying infrastructure that will accelerate connectivity and aid the consistent rollout of low-cost connectivity solutions in these areas that have non-existence or limited network coverage and broadband services,” the company stated.

Commenting, Chief Executive Officer, MTN Nigeria, Karl Toriola said, “Mindful of the unique responsibility we have to keep Nigeria and Nigerians connected to the people they love and the information, services, and technology they need, we will continue to invest in the resilience of our network, accelerating the expansion of our 4G coverage and rural connectivity programme.”

Speaking about the brand’s performance, the CEO explained that the company experienced an increase in revenue in areas like voice, data, and service.

“Service revenue grew by 14.7 per cent, in line with our medium-term targets, driven mainly by voice and data revenue. Voice revenue growth was 5.9 per cent, and although this was subdued in the second quarter due to COVID-19 induced restrictions, we saw a pickup in momentum into H2. Data revenue rose by 51.2 per cent, with increased data usage and traffic. To accommodate this and enhance service quality, we focused on capacity upgrades and 4G population coverage while expanding our investments in rural connectivity. Our 4G network now covers 60.1 per cent of the population, up from 43.8 per cent in 2019,” he said.