The Federal Government has announced that the rollout of its planned 90,000-kilometre nationwide fibre-optic network will begin in October 2026.
The Minister of Communications, Innovation and Digital Economy, Bosun Tijani, disclosed this on Thursday at the National Innovation Hub Standards Framework event.
The announcement comes days after the Federal Government incorporated Bridge Open Access (Bridge OA), an independent company established to deliver the nationwide fibre-optic network under Project BRIDGE.
Tijani said President Bola Tinubu had approved efforts to deepen connectivity across Nigeria, leading to the government’s investment in the additional 90,000 kilometres of fibre-optic infrastructure.
He said funding for the project had been secured and implementation would commence in October.
“By the time we are done, it’s going to be either the third or second longest fibre-optic network on the African continent, somewhere between what we have in South Africa and Egypt. And this is a project that is starting implementation in October. We have raised the funding for it,” Tijani said.
The minister said the government also plans to deploy towers in communities without adequate network coverage.
However, he noted that satellite technology would be used to connect locations where installing telecommunications towers would be impracticable.
“There are some places where we can’t get to at all, so we can’t put towers there. But with satellites, we can reach those locations as well,” he said.
Tijani said the government’s connectivity efforts would target more than 20 million people living in communities without access to telecommunications services.
He also stressed the importance of digital technology to Nigeria’s economic development, saying the country could not achieve sustainable growth without integrating technology into key sectors.
According to the minister, digital technologies, technology businesses and start-ups have created a multi-million-dollar ecosystem in Nigeria, making digital adoption increasingly important for businesses seeking to grow.
Also speaking at the event, the Director-General of the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Kashifu Inuwa, disclosed that Nigeria has more than 339 innovation hubs.
However, he noted that the hubs are largely concentrated in Lagos and Abuja, creating an uneven distribution of innovation infrastructure across the country.
Inuwa expressed optimism that the Innovation Standards Framework, currently at the draft stage, would help innovators across Nigeria scale their businesses and develop more mature ventures once finalised.
He said the government’s role would be to provide the policies, interventions and enabling environment needed for stakeholders to build a stronger technology ecosystem.
Inuwa said he looked forward to a situation where entrepreneurs would not have to travel from cities such as Yola to Yaba in Lagos to develop their businesses.
He argued that a standardised innovation framework across the country would help create opportunities for innovators regardless of their location.
Project BRIDGE has been in development since 2024, when the Federal Executive Council approved the establishment of a special purpose vehicle to facilitate the deployment of 90,000 kilometres of fibre-optic cable across Nigeria.
In May 2024, Tijani announced the approval, describing the additional infrastructure as a way to deepen Nigeria’s digital backbone and increase national connectivity capacity.
The government had said the project would add 90,000 kilometres to Nigeria’s existing 35,000-kilometre fibre network, taking the combined national backbone to approximately 125,000 kilometres.
The government is also working to extend internet access to 20 million Nigerians by leveraging the Nigerian Communications Satellite Limited (NigComSat).
The planned infrastructure expansion comes as Nigeria’s information and communications technology sector continues to contribute significantly to economic activity.
The ICT sector recorded 31.63% year-on-year growth in nominal terms in the first quarter of 2025, according to data from the National Bureau of Statistics.
The growth represented a 28.23 percentage-point increase from the 3.40% recorded in the corresponding quarter of 2024.
The sector’s contribution to nominal GDP also increased to 10.29% in Q1 2025, compared with 9.25% in Q1 2024, reinforcing the growing importance of technology and digital services to Nigeria’s economy.
