Nigeria Strengthens ICT sector with new Critical National Information Infrastructure Order

To protect the ICT sector, Nigeria has released the ‘Designation and Protection of Critical National Information Infrastructure Order, 2024’ to curb the destruction of communication infrastructure in the country.

The significant development was disclosed on Wednesday, August 21, 2024, on X (formerly Twitter) by Dr Bosun Tijani, the Minister of Communications, Innovation, and the Digital Economy.

“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,” Dr Bosun Tijani said.

He emphasized that protecting the nation’s critical infrastructure is a top concern as it would improve the quality of telecommunications services, which are regularly disrupted by deliberate infrastructure damage.

“We will continue to work to create an enabling and supportive environment and policies for our digital economy to thrive,” Dr. Tijani said.

Telecommunications companies have pushed for strict legislation to safeguard the industry and designate telecom infrastructure as essential national resources.

In response to the nation’s internet outage brought on by damage to optic fibre cables, Gbenga Adebayo, Head of the Nigeria Association of Licensed Telecommunications Operators, reaffirmed the proposal in March of this year.