Nigeria is seeking to leverage nearly $1 billion in annual public-sector technology demand to accelerate the development of a robust domestic cloud computing ecosystem and reduce reliance on offshore digital infrastructure.
The Director General of the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Kashifu Inuwa , disclosed this on Wednesday at a workshop on “Nigeria’s Digital Infrastructure Opportunity” at ITW Data Cloud Africa 2026 in Nairobi, Kenya.
Inuwa said the Federal Government was repositioning public-sector technology spending as a catalyst for private investment in cloud infrastructure, noting that Nigeria’s huge digital market presented significant opportunities for global technology companies and local infrastructure developers.
He said 326 federal Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) spent N3.89 trillion, equivalent to about $2.9 billion, on technology investments between 2023 and mid-2026.
According to him, government technology demand alone generates close to $1 billion annually, which the government intends to increasingly channel towards cloud services and shared digital architecture.
“Government demand alone generates nearly $1 billion annually. We want to use this purchasing power to create a predictable market for cloud infrastructure and encourage private-sector investment rather than having isolated public data centres,” Inuwa said.
The NITDA boss said the strategy was being driven by the newly institutionalised Cloud-First Policy, designed to consolidate public-sector demand and create a predictable market for cloud service providers.
He said Nigeria’s existing local data capacity was operating at nearly 90 per cent utilisation, making increased investment in domestic computing infrastructure imperative.
Inuwa also announced measures to address regulatory uncertainty, which he identified as one of the major barriers to digital infrastructure investment.
He said NITDA was working towards a unified regulatory interface that would enable technology investors to navigate compliance requirements across government agencies through a single platform.
“To ensure investor confidence, NITDA is replacing fragmented, unpredictable oversight with a unified regulatory approach,” he said.
According to him, the framework would promote cross-agency alignment and common baseline standards, allowing sector regulators such as the Central Bank of Nigeria to adopt shared requirements and facilitate the migration of critical financial-sector data to local cloud platforms.
He stressed that the objective was market creation and healthy competition rather than excessive regulation or revenue generation.
“This framework is designed purely for market creation, prioritising healthy competition and international interoperability over rigid localisation rules,” Inuwa said.
The NITDA director-general said Nigeria’s expanding digital economy provided strong fundamentals for the investment drive, with broadband penetration exceeding 56 per cent, alongside 192 million mobile subscribers and 157 million internet users.
He said the domestic cloud market was projected to rise from about $376 million in 2026 to more than $783 million by 2031.
Inuwa added that the National Digital Cloud Policy was targeting $750 million in digital infrastructure investments within two years, beginning with $250 million in private capital in the first year.
He said Nigeria’s ambition extended beyond its domestic market, with the country seeking to position itself as a regional digital infrastructure hub serving markets across West and Central Africa.
“Our ambition is not just to build infrastructure for Nigeria, but to create a regional digital ecosystem that gives African countries greater control over how their data is secured, hosted and scaled,” he said.
He added that harmonising digital standards with neighbouring countries would facilitate cross-border data flows and strengthen Africa’s digital sovereignty while opening new markets for cloud infrastructure providers.
