After a pretty dismal showing in 2025, twenty-three Nigerian states are now pencilling in a combined N132.45 billion for their technology ministries and digital economy projects in the 2026 budgets.
That is according to the latest figures pulled from BudgIT’s Open States platform, basically a fourfold leap from the measly N33.59 billion they spent last year.
On the surface, it looks impressive. The same states had approved N80.21 billion for tech-related stuff in 2025, but only executed about 42 per cent of it. Tech barely moved the needle, as the majority of the states spent only 0.25 per cent of total state spending.
In 2026, the projection bumps that share to roughly 0.53 per cent. Still tiny. Less than 60 kobo out of every N100 budgeted.
The states naming tech or digital economy line items for next year are: Abia, Akwa Ibom, Bauchi, Bayelsa, Benue, Cross River, Delta, Ebonyi, Edo, Ekiti, Enugu, Gombe, Imo, Kano, Kebbi, Kogi, Lagos, Ondo, Osun, Plateau, Sokoto, Taraba, and Yobe.
Thirteen others either skipped having a proper standalone ministry or just didn’t provide clear funding for digital agencies.
Nasarawa, Borno and Kwara don’t have dedicated tech ministries, while places like Niger, Katsina and Ogun left digital spending vague or buried elsewhere.
The headline number sounds ambitious, a 65 per cent jump over what was approved for 2025, but history isn’t kind here. Underspending has been the norm. So the real question isn’t the budget figure on paper; it is whether any meaningful chunk of this money will turn into fibre cables, platforms, or services that actually move the needle on economic growth.
States matter a lot more than people sometimes realise in Nigeria’s digital story. They approve rights-of-way for fibre trenches, nurture (or choke) local startup scenes, and handle digitisation of everyday government stuff like land records, payroll, and tax collection at the local level. Yet tech spending stays marginal compared to the grand talk in national plans.
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The United Nations Trade and Development estimates that achieving universal digital connectivity, financial inclusion and higher value-added production could require investments equivalent to about $1,231 per person annually, far beyond current state-level commitments.
The N132 billion across those 23 states isn’t even close to bridging this gap, especially when big fibre projects in urban areas can eat tens of billions alone depending on terrain and politics around rights-of-way.
The Nigerian Communications Commission has previously warned that inadequate public funding at subnational levels remains a structural barrier to ICT expansion, noting that successive administrations have faced difficulties financing digital infrastructure through traditional budget channels. Visible projects, limited depth. Across the country, digital ambition is not in short supply.
Lagos keeps pouring money into its innovation ecosystem. The Lagos State Science Research and Innovation Council (LASRIC) runs a N1 billion fund; they are laying thousands of kilometres of metro fibre, even talking about ring-fencing 1.5 percent to two per cent of capital spend for innovation.
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Ogun has its tech hub pushing digital literacy and startups. Ekiti’s Knowledge Zone got that big $80 million AfDB backing and wants to become a proper regional brain hub. Enugu is chasing Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) for infrastructure. Edo rolled out a data centre for e-governance. Kwara opened an innovation spot in Ilorin last year.
Anambra’s ICT crew is tinkering with AI to catch payroll ghosts and clean up service delivery. The state launched SmartGov, powered by Artificial Intelligence (AI), enabling citizens to interact with the government through natural conversations rather than complex procedures or paperwork.
Describing the platform and its functionality, Chukwuemeka Fred Agbata,, MD/CEO of the Anambra State ICT Agency, told BusinessDay that the SmartGov was built with citizens at the centre.
“SmartGov is more than a service directory. It is an intelligent gateway that makes government interactions simple, fast, and reliable. SmartGov is a practical expression of this vision. By embedding AI into everyday government services, Anambra State is making governance more transparent, accessible, and efficient for Ndi Anambra.”
But dig into the 23 states’ budget breakdowns and a pattern emerges: too much goes to recurrent costs like salaries, overhead, consultancies, which account for about 23 per cent of the 2026 tech pot. That squeezes the capital side hard.
Long-haul stuff like fibre backbones, proper cloud setups, interoperable platforms often get shortchanged for quicker wins like hardware buys or short training programmes.
The deeper issue is fiscal reality. Most states lean heavily on FAAC handouts and struggle to grow serious internal revenue. When cash is tight, digital dreams compete with salaries, debt payments, hospitals, schools and those visible things like roads and bridges that politicians love because voters can see and touch them right away.
Tech payoffs take longer, feel abstract, and rarely win elections on their own. There is a signalling game too. Governors announce smart-city visions, innovation hubs, digital economy roadmaps; it sounds great in press releases. Without steady capital follow-through and real execution muscle, though, they stay mostly talk.
In some cases, leadership of technology ministries is shaped more by political considerations than technical expertise, further affecting execution.
Nigeria’s broader digital economy goals, like expanding broadband penetration, strengthening e-governance systems, growing startups and building digital public infrastructure, depend on coordinated investment at the federal and state levels.
At under one per cent of total expenditure in most states, current allocations suggest that digital transformation remains a secondary priority in fiscal terms, even as rhetoric around the knowledge economy intensifies. The N132.45 billion planned for 2026 signals intent.
Whether it marks a turning point in actual digital infrastructure delivery will depend less on headline figures and more on execution rates, capital focus and the ability of states to align ambition with sustained funding.
For now, the numbers tell a cautious story: rising allocations after a year of underspending, modest budget shares in a capital-hungry sector, and a widening gap between digital aspirations and fiscal commitment.
