Nearly one billion Africans remain without internet access, despite significant progress in mobile connectivity and digital innovation across the continent, the 7th Special Session of the African Telecommunications Union Administrative Council heard in Abuja this week. The meeting brought together telecommunications regulators, policymakers, and government officials from across Africa to review the union’s activities for the 2023 to 2026 period and harmonise strategies ahead of its forthcoming Conference of Plenipotentiaries.
Nigeria’s Federal Government used the occasion to call for deeper regional cooperation, with Permanent Secretary of the Federal Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy, Nadungu Gagare, stressing that no single country could achieve the continent’s digital aspirations alone. He urged member states to work together to expand connectivity, improve digital infrastructure, promote digital skills, strengthen cybersecurity and enhance data protection.
“We believe that regional cooperation is essential if Africa is to build a strong, inclusive and innovative digital economy to empower our growing youth population,” Gagare said.
A Progress Report With Caveats
Africa has made significant progress in the ICT sector over the years. Mobile connectivity has grown, digital innovation is expanding rapidly, and governments are increasingly adopting digital technologies to improve public service delivery. Yet more than one billion Africans remain offline, and the continent is still lagging in terms of internet penetration.
ATU Secretary-General John Omo described the meeting as a key statutory step in preparations for the union’s forthcoming conference, warning that the organisation can only exercise its mandate effectively when proposals submitted by member states are legally sound, credible and fully implemented.
The ATU Administrative Council Chairperson and Director-General of South Africa’s Department of Communications and Digital Technologies, Nonkqubela Jordan-Dyani, urged African countries to strengthen their common positions ahead of international negotiations. “The common position advanced through the ATU process must reflect Africa’s priorities with clarity and be supported consistently by our delegation. A united Africa will have greater influence in international decision-making and will be better placed to advance and protect the interests of our continent,” she said.
Why the Urgency
The connectivity gap is not simply an infrastructure problem. It is a development emergency with a ticking demographic clock. With Africa’s youth population projected to hit 830 million by 2050 and 12 million young people entering the workforce every year, a continent where one billion people remain offline is a continent whose greatest economic asset, its youth, is being systematically excluded from the digital economy in which their futures will be shaped.
Africa’s digital economy is projected to grow from $34 billion in 2026 to $72 billion by 2031, according to industry estimates. That growth is largely concentrated in countries with stronger connectivity infrastructure and urban tech hubs. The billion people still offline are predominantly in rural areas, in lower-income countries, and among women and older populations, whose exclusion from the digital economy compounds existing inequalities rather than correcting them.
The ATU’s push for regional harmonisation addresses one of the most persistent obstacles to closing that gap: the fragmentation of spectrum policy, regulatory frameworks, and infrastructure investment across 54 African member states. When each country negotiates independently in international telecoms forums, the continent’s collective leverage is significantly diminished. When African states present a unified position, as the meeting in Abuja is designed to produce, the outcome is a stronger continental voice on spectrum allocation, satellite access, and the terms on which global tech companies operate in African markets.
What Comes Next
The Special Session feeds directly into the ATU’s 7th Ordinary Conference of Plenipotentiaries, its highest decision-making body, scheduled for later in 2026. On the 22nd July, the ATU will co-host a Digital Africa Summit Workshop with GSMA, convened as a preparatory gathering ahead of the main conference. The decisions produced at that conference will shape the union’s mandate and priorities for the next four-year cycle.
Whether that mandate produces the accelerated connectivity expansion the continent needs will depend on whether member states translate the unified language of Abuja into aligned national investment and regulatory decisions. One billion Africans offline is not a number that resolves through declarations. It resolves through spectrum policy, infrastructure investment, affordable data, and the kind of coordinated regional action the ATU exists to produce.
Africa Presents is a Pan-African digital magazine and monthly publication covering politics, business, economy, culture, tech, and the stories shaping Africa and its diaspora. Visit africapresents.com and follow @AfricaPresents for daily coverage and monthly themed magazine editions.
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