President Bola Tinubu is the target of a lawsuit brought by the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project, or SERAP, over the Nigerian Communications Commission’s (NCC) alleged “arbitrary, unconstitutional, unlawful, unfair, and unreasonable 50 percent telecom tariff hike.”
Also joined in the suit as defendants are the NCC, which recently approved a 50 percent hike in telecom tariffs.
The average price of calls will rise to N16.5 per minute from N11; the cost of 1GB of data will rise to N431.25 from N287.5/GB; and SMS prices will rise to N6 from N4 by the increase.
The suit, with number FHC/ABJ/CS/111/2025, was filed last Friday at the Federal High Court, Abuja. SERAP is asking the court to determine “whether the unilateral decision by the NCC to authorise telcos to hike telecom tariffs by 50 percent is not arbitrary, unconstitutional, unlawful, unfair, unreasonable, and inconsistent with citizens’ freedom of expression and access to information.”.
SERAP is also asking the court for a declaration that the unilateral decision by the NCC to authorise telcos to hike the telecom tariff by 50 percent is arbitrary, unfair, unreasonable, inconsistent, and incompatible with citizens’ freedom of expression and access to information and therefore unconstitutional and unlawful.
An order of interim injunction, according to SERAP, is seeking to restrain the NCC, its officers, agents, privies, assigns, or any other person or persons acting on its instructions from further implementing, enforcing, and doing any act to give effect to the decision of the NCC authorizing a telecom tariff hike of 50 percent.
SERAP, in the suit, argued that the legal and constitutional provisions as well as international standards on freedom of expression and access to information constitute the repository of legality, adding that the requirements of legality constrain the exercise of statutory powers by the NCC to authorise any increase in telecom tariffs.
The suit filed on behalf of SERAP by its lawyer, Ebun-Olu Adegboruwa, SAN, on behalf of SERAP imposes clear duties of fairness and reasonableness on the NCC in the exercise of its powers to authorize the telecom tariff hike by 50 percent, which is the subject-matter of this suit.
The NCC is required under the legal provisions on consumers’ rights and constitutional and international standards on freedom of expression and access to information to base its decision on reasonable interpretations of its enabling statutes and guidelines and other relevant legal frameworks and to follow due process.
Written By Amos Tauna