Dike Onwuamaeze
Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI) has stated that Nigeria needs regulatory coherence, consistent access to foreign exchange (FX), and accelerated implementation of Nigeria Start-up Act to regain its position as Africa’s leading digital investment destination.
That was declared yesterday by President of LCCI, Mr. Leye Kupoluyi, in his welcome address at the opening ceremony of the chamber’s “ICTEL Expo 2026”, with the theme, “Africa Next Tech Frontier: Building, Securing and Scaling Digital Process.”
Kupoluyi stated that Nigeria slipped from its position as Africa’s leading start-up-funding destination to the fourth place in 2025, even though the ICT sector contributed 10.07 per cent to Nigeria’s real GDP and closed April 2026 with 154.7 million active internet subscribers, 188 million mobile connections, and broadband penetration at 55.67 per cent, up from 48.81 per cent just a year earlier.
He added, “Nigeria’s digital economy is no longer an emerging story; it is now the fastest-growing engine of our non-oil economy, and the decisions we make this week will determine whether Africa’s next trillion dollars is built here (in Nigeria) or elsewhere.”
Kupoluyi acknowledged that Nigeria’s connectivity gains were real, but pointed out that in 2025, “Nigeria slipped from Africa’s leading start-up-funding destination to fourth place, overtaken by Kenya ($879 million), South Africa ($848 million) and Egypt ($561 million).
“The lesson is unambiguous: infrastructure without capital, and capital without policy certainty, will not scale a single Nigerian tech champion into a continental one.”
According to him, “Nigeria must actively compete for capital, not merely wait for it.
“African tech funding rebounded 25 per cent year-on-year to $4.1 billion in 2025, and debt financing now 41 per cent of all capital deployed, up from just 17 per cent in 2019, showing investors increasingly reward proven revenue and governance over hype.
“Regulatory coherence, not regulatory volume, will determine who scales.
“Multiple, overlapping levies, inconsistent forex access for tech payments, and slow implementation of the Nigeria Startup Act have continued to raise the cost of scaling relative to peer markets. Predictability is now as valuable to investors as incentives.”
Kupoluyi said the implications of these on business was that the cost of uncertainty was now higher than the cost of investment.
Therefore, he said, “Companies that once absorbed policy unpredictability as a Nigerian ‘tax’ are increasingly redirecting expansion capital to Nairobi, Cairo, and Johannesburg.
“Every month of regulatory ambiguity is a month of capital flight we can no longer afford, particularly as the African Continental Free Trade Area digital trade protocol brings a 1.3-billion-person market within reach of any founder who can scale from a stable base.”
The president of LCCI emphasised that infrastructure must be treated as a public utility and not as a private luxury.
He stated that Nigeria’s broadband penetration was still short of the 70 per cent national target while fibre-to-the-home adoption was below the African average.
He identified closing the last-mile gap, especially in underserved states, as the single fastest lever available to expand the country’s digital contribution to the GDP above 10 per cent.
Kupoluyi said, “The LCCI’s call to action is firm: build together, or watch others scale faster.
“We ask the government to match our urgency with implementation speed, and we ask this room of investors, founders, and operators to reinvest conviction, not just capital, in Nigeria.
“Africa’s next tech frontier will not be announced. It will be built, quarter by quarter, by those willing to act now.”
Chairman of LCCI’s ICT Group, Mr. Segun Okuneye, said countries were living through one of the most profound technological transformations in history.
Okuneye stated, “For Africa, this transformation presents an unprecedented opportunity – not merely to participate in the digital economy but to lead in areas where innovation, youthful talent, and entrepreneurship intersect.
“Nigeria, in particular, possesses remarkable strengths. We have one of the youngest populations in the world, a vibrant startup ecosystem, globally recognised technology entrepreneurs, and an increasingly resilient digital economy.
“These assets position us to become a major technology hub on the African continent.
“However, opportunities alone do not guarantee prosperity. Digital prosperity must be intentionally built.”