Association of Licensed Telecommunications Operators of Nigeria (ALTON), official industry body and advocacy group for major telecommunications providers in Nigeria, has backed the Central Bank of Nigeria’s (CBN) directive requiring banks and fintechs to host payment transaction data locally.

Gbenga Adebayo, chairman, ALTON

Gbenga Adebayo, chairman, ALTON, said this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagosat the weekend.

His position follows a recent CBN directive mandating that banks, fintechs, and other payment service providers store payment transaction data generated in Nigeria on local servers from January 1, 2027.

The directive forms part of measures aimed at strengthening oversight of the country’s rapidly growing digital payments ecosystem.

Adebayo said data sovereignty required countries to take responsibility for their entire data value chain.

According to him, this covers data collection, management, storage, and integrity assurance.

“We cannot continue to outsource that to other jurisdictions.

“The more we host our data locally, the better for us,” he said.

Adebayo said local hosting would enable Nigeria to manage data end-to-end and guarantee the integrity of critical information.

He noted that hosting payment data outside the country increased communication requirements, latency, and retrieval costs.

“For every transaction involving data hosted outside our shores, communication has to take place from your location to the host and back.

“It increases latency and also increases the cost of data retrieval,” he said.

The ALTON chairman described the directive as an important first step toward achieving national data sovereignty.

He also dismissed concerns about infrastructure readiness, saying Nigeria already had significant data center capacity.

According to him, several Nigerian-owned facilities currently host data for organisations operating from other jurisdictions.

“I’m happy to say that we have a lot of data centres owned and managed by Nigerians that are hosting data from other jurisdictions.

“If people overseas can host their data here, why can’t we host our own data here?” he queried.

Adebayo argued that local hosting would reduce dependence on foreign infrastructure while improving national control over data security.

He said concerns about security and reliability should not justify continued reliance on foreign hosting providers.

“No one can protect your house better than yourself.

“You have more at stake in terms of security and safety than somebody else hosting your data,” he said.

The telecom industry leader also highlighted the cost implications of local hosting.

He said organisations that host data locally would pay in local currency rather than foreign currency.

According to him, this would help reduce exposure to exchange rate pressures and lower long-term operating costs.

Adebayo said Nigeria currently had about six Tier III data centres, with additional facilities under development.

He, however, stressed that capacity was more important than the number of facilities.

“It’s not just about the numbers; it’s about the capacity of what they can host.

“So far, we can,” he said.

He urged stakeholders to accelerate efforts toward domestic data hosting and management.

“The earlier we begin to domesticate our data hosting and data management, the better for us,” Adebayo added.

Ifeanyi Nwanegbo, a distinguished Data Scientist and Applied Data Science professional, has been honoured as the Outstanding Innovator in Applied Artificial Intelligence and Data Science at the 2024 Africa Digital Awards (ADA). The prestigious event, held recently at the Oriental Hotel in Lagos, brought together the continent’s tech elite to celebrate pioneers pushing the boundaries of the digital economy.

In a formal recognition letter signed by Tayo Adewusi, the Publisher and CEO of ICT Watch Magazine, organizers of the awards, the body noted that Nwanegbo’s selection was in deep appreciation of his leadership role in reshaping core business operations through technology.

“His ability to build complex predictive models and robust data pipelines using Python, SQL, and AWS has positioned him as a transformative figure in the field of applied analytics,” the letter reads.

Nwanegbo’s professional journey highlights a consistent track record of converting raw data into strategic assets. With a Master of Science in Data Analytics and Information Systems from Texas State University, he has demonstrated expertise in transforming disparate datasets into actionable insights. His work focuses on feature engineering, statistical analysis, and machine learning to drive high-level business decisions and operational improvements.

His impact has been felt across major global and local organizations, including a significant tenure as a Data Scientist at MTN Group. During his time with the telecommunications giant, Nwanegbo analyzed large-scale customer and operational datasets to support data-driven decision-making across commercial teams.

He successfully transformed transactional and behavioral data into structured analytical sets, enabling more accurate customer segmentation and trend analysis.

At Texas State University, Nwanegbo led critical projects as an Analytics and Data Systems Associate, including a full-scale migration of departmental data systems from Gato to Calico. This project involved redesigning schemas and restructuring ingestion workflows to ensure long-term system reliability.

His work supported KPI tracking and student engagement analysis, providing academic leadership with the repeatable analytical workflows necessary for modern institutional management.

Beyond his corporate and academic roles, Nwanegbo has distinguished himself through high-impact technical projects, such as developing an end-to-end sales demand forecasting and inventory optimization pipeline. By utilizing Python and ARIMA models, he improved forecast accuracy to reduce stockouts and holding costs, demonstrating the tangible economic value of applied AI in supply chain management.

The Africa Digital Awards recognition serves as a testament to Nwanegbo’s technical certifications, including his status as an AWS Certified Solutions Architect, Professional and a Project Management Professional (PMP).

As the continent continues its digital shift, innovators like Nwanegbo remain central to building the high-velocity smart systems that will define Africa’s industrial and technological future.

Every June 19th, the world pauses to recognize something that, for millions of families, never pauses at all. World Sickle Cell Day is observed across the globe to bring sickle cell disease out of the shadows; to name it, to understand it, and to stand with the people who live with it every single day.

This year, the world marks the day under the theme “Closing the Survival Gap: Equity in Sickle Cell Disease.” It’s a phrase that asks a hard, necessary question: why should where you’re born, or what your family can afford, decide whether you live well, or live at all?

For us at Indwelt, that question isn’t abstract. It has names and faces we know.

Why this day means something to us;

Here in Nigeria, sickle cell isn’t a distant statistic. Our country carries the heaviest burden of the disease anywhere in the world; roughly 150,000 babies are born with it here each year, and millions of Nigerians live with it into adulthood. Behind those numbers are real people: managing pain that often goes unseen, navigating crises that arrive without warning, and carrying on with a quiet courage that most of us will never fully understand.

Some of those people are our colleagues.

Since our inception, we’ve had and still have team members who live with sickle cell. They show up, they create, they pour themselves into the work we’re proud to put our name on; and they do it while carrying something most of us never have to think about.

Our team member with sickle cell, put it to us simply:

“People see the work I deliver, but they don’t see the days I show up after a night I didn’t think I’d get through. Sickle cell is part of my story, but it isn’t the whole of me; and being a part of an organization that understands that, supports me and let’s me do work I’m proud of continues to make a difference for me. I don’t want sympathy. I want a world that takes this seriously enough to change the odds for the next person.”

Supporting them, through medical interventions and through simply being a workplace that sees them fully, has never felt like a policy or a perk. It’s felt like family looking after family.

That’s where our commitment began. Not in a boardroom, but in the everyday reality of caring for our own.

If you’ve ever asked; this is the reason we’ve chosen to anchor our Corporate Social responsibility around sickle cell, supporting initiatives that improve care, and backing the research working toward a future where this disease no longer steals so many years from so many lives.

We believe the survival gap can close. We’ve seen what changes when someone living with sickle cell is met with the right care, the right understanding, and the right support; they don’t just survive, they thrive. They build, they lead, they make beautiful things. We know this because we work alongside them.

So, our promise is simple: to put our resources, our voice, and our craft behind the people and the science fighting for better outcomes. To keep learning. To keep listening to those who live this reality. And to use whatever reach we have to make sure that, in this country with the world’s heaviest burden, no one feels they’re carrying it alone.

For someone living with sickle cell, care that comes to you and care you can actually afford aren’t luxuries; they’re often the difference between a crisis managed and a crisis survived. We’re proud to walk alongside teams doing that quiet, necessary work.

To anyone living with sickle cell, today and every day; we see your strength; including the kind that doesn’t look like strength, the kind that’s just getting through a hard day and showing up for the next one. You are not your diagnosis. You are not a burden. You are someone we’re honoured to stand beside.

And to everyone reading: you don’t need a CSR budget to make a difference today. Learn what sickle cell really is. Know your genotype. Have the conversation. Give blood if you can. Be gentle with the people around you who may be carrying more than they let on.

Awareness is where compassion begins; and compassion, multiplied, is how survival gaps close.

This World Sickle Cell Day, we’re thinking of our own. And we’re committed to doing our part, not just today, but in all the days that follow.

To our clients, we owe a particular thank you. Every brief you trust us with, every project we build together, every time you choose Indwelt; you are doing more than growing your business. You are helping fund the care, the awareness, and the research behind this cause. The work we do for you is quietly working for someone living with sickle cell, too. That partnership means more to us than you may realise, and we’re deeply grateful for it.

Awareness is where compassion begins; and compassion, multiplied, is how survival gaps close. This World Sickle Cell Day, we’re thinking of our own. And we’re committed to doing our part, not just today, but in all the days that follow.