The latest industry statistics from the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) shows the number of telecom subscribers in the country dropped by 11.84 million in four months.
This is as a result of the Nigerian Communication Commission’s (NCC) directive in December for TelCos to suspend sales, registration and activation of new SIM cards as well as hindering porting activities.
The report states that telecommunication operators in the country recorded a loss of 4.13 million active subscribers in February 2021.
However, the industry recorded 195.73 million GSM users in the same month.
In a breakdown of subscriber statistics, Airtel lost the highest number of subscribers in February with a drop of 1.99 million subscribers from 53.42 million subscribers in January to 51.43 million customers.
MTN had 79.03 million subscribers in January but experienced a loss of 1.68 million subscribers leading it to 77.34 million subscribers in February.
This is followed by Globacom, who lost 415,071 subscribers recording a total of 54.17 million subscribers as against 54.59 million users in January.
9mobile had 12.80 million users in January, lost 35,698 subscribers in February with a total of 12.77 million users.
However, MTN remains Nigeria’s largest mobile network operator with 39.52 per cent market share while Globacom replaced Airtel as the second-largest operator in January with 27.68 per cent market share while Airtel followed with 26.28 per cent market share and 9mobile remained the fourth operator with 6.41 per cent market share.
As the number of subscriptions dropped from 200.21 million in January to 196.07 million in February, Nigeria’s teledensity dropped by 2.17 per cent.
The broadband penetration continued to fall as February recorded 42.06 per cent from 42.93 per cent in January, a 3.87 per cent decrease from 45.93 per cent recorded in October 2020.
Meanwhile, the Internet subscribers in Nigeria decreased by 2.76 million in February, with the total number of Internet users dropping to 148.13 million from 150.89 million in January.
