Internet Users in Nigeria Drop by Over 2 Million

The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has revealed that internet users on Nigeria’s telecommunications networks reduced to 93.75 million for February 2016.

The NCC while making the announcement in its monthly Internet Subscriber Data in Lagos, suggested that the decline may not be unconnected to the present economic crunch in the country.

While 95.94 million subscribers surfed the internet in January, the telecom outfits noted a steep decline in demand for such services where, otherwise, they tend to rise.

Of the 93.6 million internet users on the GSM networks in the month under review, MTN Nigeria had 35.6 million customers browsing the internet on its network, a decline of 2.6 million internet subscribers in February from its January figure of 38.21 million.

Globacom recorded an increase as it had 25.68 million customers surfing the net in February, as the number increased by 248,593 from the January’s record of 25.43 million.

Airtel Nigeria, it said, had 17 million internet users in the month of February, as against 16.85 million customers recorded in January, representing an increase by 224,037 in February.

The data added that Etisalat had 15.23 million internet users in February, against the 15.28 million in January, hence, reducing by 52,251 in the month under review.

It also revealed that the CDMA operators (Multi-Links and Visafone), had a joint total of 150,125 internet users on their networks in February, representing a decrease of 52 subscribers.

The NCC also noted that the country was making progress towards achieving 30 per cent broadband penetrations by 2018.