The National Assembly’s Communications Committees have approved the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) 2024 budget, amounting to N549.6 billion.
The telecommunications regulatory agency’s 2024 budget proposal was presented at the joint session of the Senate and House of Representatives Committees on Communications chaired by Senator Ikra Bilbis (Zamfara Central) and attended by the Executive Vice Chairman/CEO of the (NCC), Dr. Aminu Maida participated.
The committee members unanimously approved the NCC’s N549.6 billion 2024 budget proposal through voice votes following a motion by Senator Tahir Monguno (Borno North) and subsequent ratification by committee chairman Senator Ikra Aliyu.
The committee scrutinized the performance of NCC’s 2023 budget as presented by the Executive Vice Chairman of the Commission.
The 2023 budget performance report showed an actual revenue of N448.1 billion against a projected budget of N559.080 billion, with total recurrent expenditure at N67.072 billion and capital expenditure at N3.6 billion.
Maida addressed inquiries from lawmakers on various topics such as security, revenue generation, data protection, and discrepancies found in the 2023 budget report of the NCC.
The EVC also responded and answered with lucid explanation several questions from the lawmakers concerned about security, revenue generation, data protection and violations identified in the NCC’s 2024 budget report.
The EVC informed lawmakers that the NCC aims to avoid relying solely on operator sanctions for revenue generation and is implementing measures to facilitate operators’ compliance with regulatory directives.
He emphasized that NCC collaborates with national security agencies to create a platform for tracking criminals and addressing security challenges.
Reacting to this, Senator Steve Karimi stated that the report submitted by the NCC was timely and commendable. While the Kogi West MP supported a remark, his counterpart in the House of Representatives buttressed that there were no discrepancies in the report.
Delta North Senator Ned Nwoko praised the NCC boss, he added that Dr. Maida’s profile was quite impressive. Nwoko called on the NCC’s helmsman to improve on the operations of the agency.
The lawmakers, however, praised the NCC management for the prudent use of its revenue, capital and recurrent expenditure in 2024.
While making his presentation, Dr Maida informed the lawmakers of the Commission’s decision not to impose the “sanctions against the operators” as the commission’s main source of income.
According to him, the NCC has outlined measures to make it easier for operators in the country to comply with its regulatory guidelines.
Dr Maida further explained that he and his team were working tirelessly in synergy with the country’s security agencies to provide a platform to help locate criminals easily and thus solve the country’s problems on security issues.