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The MTN Group has said that 232.5 million of its subscribers across 22 countries in Africa and the Middle East, 61.3 million of them are in Nigeria. The company in its first quarter report for 2016, which captured the subscriber growth of the telecoms company, said MTN South Africa now has 30 million subscribers. The Group said that the first quarter of 2014 saw a 1.4 percent drop overall from around 232 million subscribers in the final quarter of last year adding that it has grown its overall subscriber base by 0.8 percent.
The report showed that South Africa was one of the countries that declined in subscriber numbers, falling 1.7 percent quarterly noting that in the rest of the South East Africa region, which includes Uganda, Zambia, Rwanda, Botswana and Swaziland recorded two percent growth in subscribers base in the first quarter reaching 22.7 million.
The growth, the report was mainly driven by strong growth in Uganda where subscribers grew 7.8 percent quarterly to 9.6 million saying that a joint-venture in Botswana also saw an almost four percent increase in quarterly subscriber base. The Group however reported that there was almost seven percent quarterly to 57 million for Nigeria adding that there was also a 6.7 percent drop yearly from the 61 million subscribers the telecoms company had in Nigeria in the first quarter of 2015.
According to MTN, the remainder of the West East and Central Africa, region, which include Ghana, Cameroon, Ivory Coast, Benin, Congo-Brazzaville, Liberia, Guinea- Conakry and Guinea-Bissau however grew its subscriber base by 1.3 percent to 45.9 million. Ghana led the WECA region growing its subscriber base by 4.6 percent to 17 million followed by Cameroon which now has 9.5 million subscribers, with a 3.1 percent quarterly growth. For the Middle East and North Africa region, which includes Iran, Syria, Sudan, Yemen, Afghanistan, Cyprus and South Sudan, the subscriber growth rate was 0.7 percent to 73.6 million, with the majority of users based in Iran. MTN Irancell increased its subscriber base by one percent quarterly to 46.6 million, in what MTN calls “a highly penetrated market” saying that MTN Sudan was also a bright spot with its subscriber base growing by four percent to 8.8 million.
“MTN Syria, MTN Yemen and MTN Afghanistan remain profitable, however, they continue to operate in highly challenging environments impacting the region’s subscriber growth,” MTN said.
Source: http://nationalmirroronline.net/new/nigeria-accounts-for-61-3m-of-mtns-232-5m-global-subscribers/
