By Samuel Bankole
Airtel Africa Plc on Friday said Nigeria’s operations grew its revenue by 21.6 percent in the 9-month to December 31, 2020, as it expressed the possibility of asking for an extension on the verification of the database of its subscribers in Nigeria.
In a regulatory filing with the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) on Friday, the telecoms firm said it recorded strong revenue growth in Nigeria and East Africa, growing 21.6 percent and 23.4 percent in constant currency, while this is increasingly being matched by improvements across Francophone Africa, posting 8 percent growth for the period and 15 percent in Q3.
Nigeria had asked telecoms firms in the country to link their subscribers’ SIM cards with the National Identification Numbers (NIN) as part of measures to boost security in Africa’s most populous country.
Airtel Chief Executive Officer, Raghunath Mandava said the company has collected national identity numbers from nearly half of its customers as part of the process to adhere to regulator demands.
According to him, the Nigeria unit is currently working to verify the data collected from customers.
“This could require a little bit more time and we will not be able to complete the full exercise, in which case, after all efforts if we don’t manage by Feb. 9 then we will, I am sure discuss with the government and request for some extension,” Mandava said.
READ ALSO:Â OPEC Jan oil output rises for 7th month, Nigeria limits gain
He said Airtel’s customer base rose 11.0 percent to 118.9 million in the third quarter, with increased penetration across mobile data (customer base up 23.5 percent) and mobile money services (customer base up 29 percent).
He said the telecoms firm added 2.5 million customers in the three months to December 31, 2020.
The company said that its nine-month reported revenue increased by 13.8 percent to $2.87 billion, with third-quarter revenue up by 19.5 percent.
The company reported a slight decline in profit before tax to $482 million in the period to Dec. 31, 2020, from $501 million in the period to Dec. 31, 2019.
It attributed the drop to a combination of higher finance costs and benefits from non-operating exceptional items in the prior period.
Commenting on the financial report, Madava said; “Our nine-month performance reflects both the resilience of our business model through the Covid-19 pandemic and, for the last six months, a continued improvement in our execution and performance as lockdown restrictions have eased
across our countries of operation.
“I am particularly pleased with our performance in the latest third quarter, which has demonstrated accelerated growth
in both revenue and underlying EBITDA in constant currency to 22.8 percent and 28.3 percent respectively.
“The opportunities for sustainable profitable growth from our underpenetrated markets for both mobile and mobile money services remain hugely attractive, and we are confident of continuing to deliver on our growth strategy,” Mandava said.
In an interview with Reuters, Mandava ruled out the telecoms firm’s participation in the licence bid in Ethiopia.
He said the telecoms firm will focus on growing in the markets where it already operates on the continent and will not bid for licences in Ethiopia, where the nation of 110 million people is opening up its telecoms sector.
Africa’s second most populous nation, one of the last remaining closed telecoms markets on the continent, plans to sell a minority stake in state-owned Ethio Telecoms within nine months and is tendering for two new licences, a process that was expected to start last month.
Mandava said that the Africa-focused telecoms company sees more room to grow in the 14 countries it has already invested in, including in its biggest market in Nigeria, the continent’s most populous nation.
“We have a lower market share in Nigeria, Congo, DRC, Tanzania and Kenya. And our entire current focus is on these countries in order to grow, we are not looking at bidding for Ethiopia at this stage,” he said in an interview.
