President Bola Tinubu has directed the development of a roadmap for the full launch of Nigeria’s Digital Free Zones initiative within 180 days.
The move is aimed at preventing promising Nigerian technology companies from relocating their businesses and intellectual property abroad in order to gain access to global capital and international markets.
The President directed the Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Dr Jumoke Oduwole, to work with the Itana Innovation project and the Presidential Steering Committee on Digital Free Zones to develop the roadmap within the stipulated period.
Oduwole serves as Vice-Chairman and Implementation Coordinator of the committee, which is chaired by the President.
Under the initiative, the Federal Government seeks to enable Nigerian technology and service companies to raise international capital, employ Nigerians and serve global markets while keeping their headquarters, operations and intellectual property in the country.
President Tinubu said the initiative had entered its implementation phase, with the government working to modernise Nigeria’s more than three-decade-old free zone framework to meet the needs of the digital economy.
He added that the initiative would create opportunities for more young Nigerians to work remotely for global companies while remaining in the country. This, he said, would support employment opportunities for engineers, developers, designers, lawyers, accountants and other professionals serving digital businesses.
“Nigeria has the talent, enterprise and ambition to build companies that can compete anywhere in the world. Our responsibility as a government is to ensure that Nigerians do not have to leave Nigeria or rely on other jurisdictions to realise that potential,” Tinubu said in a statement by his Special Adviser on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga.
The President said the administration wanted a greater share of the economic value generated by Nigerian talent to remain within the domestic economy through jobs, investments, professional services, intellectual property and the growth of Nigerian businesses.
He noted that the practice of promising Nigerian entrepreneurs incorporating their companies and domiciling their intellectual property outside the country to gain access to finance and international markets must change.
“For too long, some of our most promising young entrepreneurs have felt compelled to establish their companies and intellectual property abroad to access global capital and markets. I do not accept that this must remain the case.
“I want the next generation of African technology, finance and service companies to be built, headquartered and scaled to the world from Nigerian soil,” he said.
The initiative is already taking shape through Itana, described as Nigeria’s first Digital Free Zone. It has been licensed by the Nigeria Export Processing Zones Authority to provide a platform for global and pan-African digital and service businesses to establish and operate from Nigeria.
The Africa Finance Corporation is backing the $500 million Itana Innovation project at Alaro City, Lagos.
According to the Presidency, the project will combine an enabling policy environment with an innovation campus, access to capital and other ecosystem services designed to help African startups scale their operations while retaining more of the value they create on the continent.
Tinubu said the government’s plan went beyond the establishment of conventional technology parks, stressing that Nigeria should become a base from which African companies can raise capital and serve international markets.
“We want African companies to be incorporated in Nigeria, financed here and governed from here, while serving markets across Africa and the world.
“I want a young Nigerian in Kano, Enugu, Warri, Minna, Maiduguri or Ibadan to be able to work for a global company without leaving home, and I want our founders to raise capital globally while their companies and intellectual property remain in Nigeria.
“When these businesses grow here, they employ Nigerians, use Nigerian professional services and retain more of the value they create in our economy,” the President said.
The Presidential Steering Committee is expected to continue work on regulatory, taxation, banking, immigration and arbitration issues, as well as the digitisation of government processes within the country’s free zones.
The government believes that addressing these issues would create an operating environment where technology and digitally enabled service companies can establish and expand their businesses in Nigeria while competing internationally.
Tinubu said the Digital Free Zones initiative would also position Nigeria to take advantage of the rapid expansion of Africa’s digital economy and the growth of digitally enabled trade under the African Continental Free Trade Area.
“Nigeria has the talent and the market to reshape Africa’s place in the global technology and digital economy value chain.
“This is what our Renewed Hope commitment to a digital economy looks like in practice, and this is how we transform reform into opportunities.
“We made a promise to Nigerians. We are keeping it,” President Tinubu said.
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