Nigeria’s telecommunications sector has undergone a dramatic transformation in 25 years, moving from about 250,000 fixed telephone lines to more than 170 million active mobile subscriptions, economist Bismarck Rewane has said.
Rewane, Managing Director of Financial Derivatives Company and Chairman of FCMB, said the arrival of MTN Nigeria in 2001, alongside the liberalisation of the telecommunications industry, marked a major turning point in the country’s economic development.
According to Brandspur Brand News, data from the Nigerian Communications Commission’s 2026 Spectrum Roadmap showed that Nigeria had 177.4 million active mobile subscriptions and 144.8 million active internet subscriptions as of November 2025.
Rewane said the scale of the change was also reflected in the country’s teledensity. From about 0.4 per cent at the beginning of the period, he said the figure had risen to almost 80 per cent, making telecommunications a routine part of economic and social life for most Nigerians.
The economist also pointed to the investment that has accompanied the expansion. He said combined investment in the sector, which stood at about $500 million at the start of the period, had increased to more than $75 billion.
For Rewane, the significance of the industry extends well beyond the telecommunications companies themselves. He said mobile connectivity had become critical infrastructure supporting activities across banking, commerce, healthcare, transportation and education.
The transformation has also changed how businesses and consumers interact with the economy. Services that depend on reliable communication and internet access can now reach far more people than was possible when fixed telephone lines were scarce.
Rewane argued that measuring telecommunications solely by its direct contribution to gross domestic product understates its broader economic importance. In his view, the sector’s value also lies in the economic activities it enables across other industries.
He described MTN and other operators as having evolved from providers of basic communication services into infrastructure providers that support wider economic activity.
The comments highlight the scale of Nigeria’s shift from a telecommunications market characterised by severe scarcity to one where mobile and internet connectivity have become central to everyday economic activity.
