The Nigerian Communications Commission has confirmed that MTN Nigeria and Mafab Communications Limited have paid $273.6m each for the Fifth Generation spectrum licence.
The Executive Vice Chairman of the NCC, Umar Danbatta, officially confirmed the payment status on Thursday.
Okay.ng understands that the announcement as the February 24 deadline set for the two winners of the spectrum auction elapsed.
Confirming the payments by the two licensees, Danbatta said: “I wish to officially announce that NCC has received and confirmed payments from MTN and Mafab for their acquisition of 1 slot of 100Mhz each in the 3.5Ghz spectrum auction, which was successfully conducted by the Commission on December 13, 2021. They both met the deadline of February 24, 2022 as set by the Commission.
“Arising from this and on behalf of the Honourable Minister of Communication and Digital Economy, the Board and Management of the NCC, I wish to congratulate the MTN and Mafab for this feat, as we look forward to accomplishing other deployment timelines in our 5G deployment roadmap, as articulated in the National Policy on 5G Networks for Nigeria’s Digital Economy.”
For meeting the payment deadline, Danbatta has commended the two companies for their commitment to 5G deployment drive through their private investments, which he said, was a demonstration of the licensees’ belief in the sound regulatory environment in the Nigerian telecommunications sector.
Danbatta also expressed appreciation to the Federal Government for its support and commitment to the deployment of 5G technology in Nigeria which, he said, will bring substantial network improvements, including higher connection speed, mobility and capacity, as well as low-latency capabilities to communications services in Nigeria.
According to a statement signed by Dr. Ikechukwu Adinde, Director, Public Affairs at NCC, on Thursday evening, the Commission published a Public Notice on its decision to award two lots of 100MHz Time Division Duplex (TDD) available in the 3.5 GHz band through an auction process to support the delivery of ubiquitous broadband services for the deployment of 5G technology in Nigeria.
