The Nigerian Senate’s Communications Committee has 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 NCC boss responded and answered with lucid explanations several questions from the lawmakers concerned about security, revenue generation, data protection and violations identified in the NCC’s 2024 budget report.
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 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.
According to the 2023 Budget Performance Report presented by the NCC boss, which ended December 31, the actual revenue of N448.1 billion of the planned budget of N559.08 billion has been realized.
Total recurrent expenditure was N67.072 million while capital expenditure was N3.6 million.
Subsequently, the agency’s 2024 budget proposal of N549.6 billion was approved by a vote of the committee members on the motion of Senator Tahir Monguno (Borno North) and ratified by the committee chairman, Senator Ikra Aliyu.
