NBA, Others Kick Against Proposed NITDA Bill 2021

Legal experts in Nigeria who attended the two days stakeholders’ forum on National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) Bill 2021 in Lagos, which ended at the weekend, have picked holes in the new propositions contained in the proposed bill, which is a Repeal and Re-Enactment Bill 2021.

The legal practitioners described the bill as infiltrating and an attempt to unnecessarily duplicate the regulatory powers of some existing government agencies in the country.

They made their positions known during a webinar session on ‘Stakeholders’ Engagement for Legal Practitioners in Nigeria on National Information Technology Development Agency Bill, 2021.

This followed an earlier stakeholders’ engagement meeting held by NITDA in Abuja to consider the proposed NITDA Bill 2021 which, among other things, was aimed at changing NITDA from an IT Development Agency, to a regulator of the information technology industry ecosystem.

The webinar, which was put together by the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Committee of the Nigeria Bar Association Section on Business Law (NBA-SBL), in collaboration with the NITDA and Farisad Investment Limited (FIL), was attended by stakeholders within the legal ecosystem, who reviewed the new provisions in the proposed Bill.

During the webinar anchored by the Chief Executive Officer of FIL, Sanusi Musa, the NBA President, Mr Olumide Akpata, after his brief remarks, raised three fundamental concerns on the proposed bill, which, he said, should be looked into by stakeholders at the webinar. Akpata was represented by the ICT Committee Chairman for NBA-SBL, Mr Rotimi Ogunyemi.

The tripartite concerns raised by Akpata, were around how the bill will align with the Startup Bill before the National Assembly; how the NITDA Bill intends to navigate its way within the broadband context of other regulatory functions; and what will be the implications of the penalties for violation of certain sections of the bill on the ICT business environment.

Other legal experts spoke on other areas of conflict of the proposed NITDA Bill with existing legations of some other organisations, including the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON), Computer Professional Registration Council of Nigeria (CPN), Federal Completion and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC), National Identity Management Commission (NIMC), the Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unity (NFIU), Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA), among others.

Each of the Acts establishing all these existing agencies was looked into vis-à-vis the new provisions in the NITDA Bill and it was unanimously agreed by the legal stakeholders that there were regulatory conflicts that may be detrimental to the peaceful regulatory atmosphere being experienced in the nation’s digital economy space.

Aside from some of the provisions overlapping on the regulatory functions of other agencies, the legal experts observed that a number of the provisions in the bill are ambiguous, unclear and capable of exerting substantial regulatory conflict in the system.

The legal practitioners called on those that drafted the NITDA Bill 2021 to go back and review it and ensure that they address all the areas of regulatory conflict with existing regulatory powers and functions of other agencies. Some of the stakeholders also called for an outright expunging of the conflicting sections from the bill, stating, however, that if NITDA wishes to collaborate with other agencies in some critical areas of regulations, it is better to simply “resort to signing Memoranda of Understanding (MoU) with other concerned agencies instead of interloping into their regulatory roles.”

The stakeholders further stated that NITDA was supposed to be an ICT policy development and implementation agency and should not unnecessarily arrogate regulatory powers to itself, which are already being exercised by other agencies.

Justifying the need for the review of the NITDA Act, the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Dr Isa Ibrahim Pantami, who was represented by his Technical Adviser, Prof. Saliu Junaidu, said the NITDA Act 2007 is one of the laws that require a repeal and re-enactment to keep it in tune with the developmental regulation direction of the National Digital Economy Policy and Strategy (NDEPS), 2020-2030.

Also justifying the need for the bill, Director-General of NITDA, Kashifu Abdullahi, said the scope of ICT has widened over the years with a lot of convergence and expansion in technology platforms being used by businesses and governments for delivery services. “Considering that NITDA Act is almost 16 years old, we consider it necessary to keep the Act up-to-date with the current reality in the Nigerian digital economy space,” Abdullahi said.

While providing information on the new provisions in the proposed NITDA Act 2021, Director, Legal Service Department at NITDA, Emmanuel Edet, said: “We know that some of the areas we would like to be regulating fall into the existing regulatory functions of some agencies, which informed why NITDA’s emphasis would be on collaboration.”

Responding to a question raised on over-regulating the ICT ecosystem, Edet said: “It is better to over-regulate than to under-regulate. NITDA’s vision is to evolve into a development/regulatory agency.”

He said while the major challenge identified so far by stakeholders has been the issue of regulatory overlap, NITDA would take a look at this and also put all the observations, comments and inputs by stakeholders into consideration, for further work on the proposed bill.