SpaceX’s Starlink is now in Nigeria, according to the company.
The Elon Musk-owned company confirmed this in a tweet on Monday, noting that Nigeria is the first African country to use its services.
He tweeted, “Starlink is now available in Nigeria – the first African country to receive the service.”
Nigeria is the 47th country in the world to buy Starlink internet services.
Starlink seeks to provide a global broadband network using a low-Earth orbit constellation to provide high-speed Internet coverage capable of penetrating rural and geographically isolated areas.
According to the Communications Commission of Nigeria, broadband penetration reached 47.36% in December 2022. Nigeria expects to increase broadband penetration to 50% in 2023 and 90% in 2025.
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The “Nigeria National Broadband Plan: 2020-2025” reads in part: “The new broadband plan aims to provide data download speeds across Nigeria with a minimum of 25 Mbps in urban areas and 10 Mbps in rural areas, with effective coverage available to at least 90 percent of the population by 2025 at a cost of no more than N390 per 1GB of data (i.e. 2 percent of median income or 1 percent of minimum wage).
Recently, Minister of Communications and Digital Economy Issa Pantami stated that after Starlink was licensed and launched, the country has achieved 100 percent broadband coverage.
He said: “Based on the National Broadband Plan, we should have 90% broadband coverage by December 2025. However, we recently licensed Starlink to provide services and this has given us 100 percent coverage, 3 years later.”
Although Starlink has started operations in Nigeria, there are concerns about how the high price will affect citizens’ access to its services.
