The National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) has launched a Technical Working Group (TWG) to strengthen regulatory cooperation and develop a coordinated national sandbox framework to boost Nigeria’s digital economy.
Speaking at the inauguration, Director-General Kashifu Inuwa (represented by Barrister Emmanuel Edet) stressed that regulatory agencies must work together to overcome structural barriers that slow innovation. TWG members were chosen for their strategic roles and ability to offer practical, context-sensitive solutions.
Inuwa said conventional, siloed regulatory approaches are ill-suited to the fast-evolving digital landscape, which is outpacing existing rules and sometimes delaying useful technologies. To fix this, NITDA is promoting a multi-agency framework that clarifies overlapping mandates, promotes institutional alignment, and creates adaptive mechanisms that support innovation while preserving oversight. Central to this effort are regulatory sandboxes—controlled testing environments where new technologies can be trialed under regulator supervision so lessons can be learned in practice. He emphasized the initiative won’t undermine agencies’ statutory powers but will improve coordination so Nigeria can better compete in the global digital economy.
Victoria Fabunmi, National Coordinator of the Office for Nigerian Digital Innovation (ONDI), outlined the National Regulatory Sandbox as a structured legal and governance framework—not merely a platform—designed to let innovators test emerging technologies under multi-regulator oversight before full market approval. She noted that siloed regulation, fragmented approvals, and lack of coordinated testing mechanisms have slowed progress for sectors such as AI, fintech, healthtech, blockchain, agriculture, mobility, clean energy, and digital public infrastructure. The sector-agnostic sandbox will let startups engage multiple regulators at once, reduce bureaucratic bottlenecks, shorten time-to-market, and produce shared, evidence-based insights to guide policy.
The TWG inauguration is a key step in NITDA’s strategy to reposition the Agency as an ecosystem orchestrator, fostering agile, collaborative regulation that enables responsible innovation and supports Nigeria’s goal to be a leading digital economy in Africa.
