Nigerians Spend N1.25tn On Calls , Data In Six Months

Posted by Nwa Diokpa Latest Headlines, News Across Nigeria Monday, August 1st, 2022

(AFRICAN EXAMINER) – Consumers of telecommunication services in Nigeria spent at least N1.25tn on calls and data in the first six months of 2022.

This was made known in a statement in the half-year financial report of MTN Nigeria and Airtel Africa. This figure represents a 17.77 percent increase from N1.06tn that was spent on calls and data in the corresponding period of 2021.

In the first six months of 2022, MTN Nigeria stated that it made N850.33bn from calls and data which is an increase of 18.50 percent from the N717.56bn it made in the corresponding period of 2021.

Airtel stated that its Nigerian operation made N399.39bn ($931m) from calls and data which is a 16.23 percent increase from the N343.63bn ($801m) it made in the corresponding period of 2021.

An analysis of the reports indicated that data revenues are growing faster than voice revenues. The report indicated that MTN’s data revenue grew by 51.59 percent from N229.88bn in the first six months of 2021 to N348.48bn in the corresponding period of 2022.

Also, the voice revenue of MTN only grew by 2.91 percent from N487.68bn in the first six months of 2021 to N501.85bn in the corresponding period of 2022.

Airtel Nigeria’s voice revenue grew by 10.25 percent from $478m in the first six months of 2021 to $527m in the corresponding period of 2022 and its data revenue grew by 25.08 percent from $323m in 2021 to $404m in the period under review of 2022.

In the period under review, the Nigerian Communications Commission asked telcos to bar outgoing calls from subscribers that had linked their NINs to their SIMs after a directive from the Federal Government.

At the time of following this directive, the telcos revealed that a combined 32.6 million subscribers were affected on their network.

Commenting on the firm’s financial earnings, MTN Nigeria Chief Executive Officer, Karl Toriola, said, “Despite the slower growth recorded in Q2 due in large part to the restriction of outgoing calls for approximately 19 million of our subscribers (when initially implemented) in line with the NCC’s directive, we remained largely on track, delivering service revenue growth in line with our medium-term guidance of at least 20 percent in H1.”