Tungjatjeta,
Victoria from Techpoint here,
Here’s what I’ve got for you today:
- MTN Nigeria’s profit surge hits ₦546 billion
- Kenya launches its own TikTok, UrbanTok
- Somalia is quietly building its cybersecurity rulebook
MTN Nigeria’s profit surge hits ₦546 billion
MTN Nigeria just dropped its Q1 2026 numbers, and they’re hard to ignore. The telco posted a pre-tax profit of ₦546.4 billion, up nearly 170% year-on-year, on revenue of ₦1.49 trillion, its highest quarterly haul in years. After-tax profit came in at ₦355.5 billion, while earnings per share jumped 166% to ₦16.95. Investors didn’t need time to process it. The stock jumped over 6% in a day to ₦870, pushing MTN Nigeria to the top spot as the most valuable company on the Nigerian Exchange. This doesn’t look like recovery anymore. It looks like momentum.
Under the hood, the growth is coming from everywhere that matters. Data revenue rose 56%, helped by more smartphone users and heavier Internet consumption; Nigerians are now averaging over 14GB per month. Voice is still growing, but fintech is where things get interesting. Revenue there jumped nearly 78%, and if you strip out XtraTime — MTN’s suspended airtime lending product — core fintech revenue surged over 190%. There’s also a quieter but important shift: foreign exchange, which used to drag earnings down, flipped into a ₦33 billion gain this quarter. At the same time, MTN is cutting debt, paying down over ₦150 billion.
To understand how big this turnaround is, you have to rewind. Just two years ago, MTN Nigeria was deep in the red, hit by massive forex losses and rising costs it couldn’t pass on to customers. Tariffs hadn’t been adjusted in a decade. By 2024, the company posted a ₦399 billion loss. Then came the reset: the naira stabilised, and regulators approved a long-awaited tariff hike in early 2025. By the end of that year, MTN was back in profit, and Q1 2026 suggests that wasn’t a one-off bounce but a structural shift.
Getting here wasn’t automatic. MTN spent heavily to upgrade its network once tariffs were adjusted, ramping up capital expenditure to handle rising data demand and improve service quality. That investment is now paying off in higher usage and stronger revenue. But it hasn’t been painless for customers. Many Nigerians have complained about rising data costs, with some cutting back on apps and usage just to cope. Those record profits are tied to a user base of nearly 90 million people, most of whom don’t have many alternatives.
Looking ahead, the stakes are getting even bigger. The results land alongside a major fintech restructuring that will shift control of MTN’s mobile money business to its parent company, a move aimed at unlocking more capital for growth. With earnings already this strong, expectations for higher dividends are building fast. But there are still risks: energy costs remain volatile, and the fate of XtraTime, currently tied up in a legal dispute, could further shape fintech growth. For now, though, MTN Nigeria has done something rare: it’s erased a crisis and replaced it with acceleration.
Kenya launches its own TikTok, UrbanTok
Kenya just unveiled its own answer to TikTok, and this one has government backing. Yesterday, April 30, 2026, Mzawadi Group, a Kenyan tech company, launched UrbanTok at the Connected Africa Summit in Nairobi, pitching it as a homegrown video and livestreaming platform built for creators actually to make money.
Victoria Fakiya – Senior Writer
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A top government official, ICT PS John Tanui, was right there framing it as a sovereignty play, basically saying Kenyan creators shouldn’t have to depend on foreign platforms and payment systems to earn. The platform is already live on the web with features like paywalled content, eCommerce, and crowdfunding, although its Android app quietly disappeared from the Play Store just as it launched.
At its core, UrbanTok isn’t really trying to beat TikTok on features; it’s trying to fix the money problem. Kenyan creators have long complained about earning through foreign systems like PayPal, dealing with higher gift costs, and being excluded from programmes like TikTok’s Creator Rewards. UrbanTok’s pitch is simple: keep everything local — the payments, the algorithm, the monetisation — and make it easier for creators to actually take home what they earn. It sounds compelling. Delivering on it is the real test.
And there’s a reason this matters. TikTok is huge in Kenya, with over 18 million adult users, but the money hasn’t quite matched the scale. Creator earnings are still heavily dependent on brand deals, and many feel the platform profits far more than they do. That frustration isn’t theoretical; it’s been voiced publicly by creators who feel locked out of real monetisation despite driving engagement. UrbanTok is stepping directly into that gap, positioning itself as the platform that finally closes it.
However, Kenya has flirted with regulating — even banning — TikTok in the past over content concerns, and there have been earlier attempts at local alternatives like Yafreeka that never really took off. But the global conversation has shifted. TikTok’s legal battles in the US and wider debates around digital sovereignty have pushed governments, including Kenya’s, to start thinking about ownership of platforms, data, and revenue. UrbanTok is arriving at that exact moment, though the missing app on launch day shows it’s still a work in progress.
Zoom out, and this is part of a bigger trend: countries trying to build their own digital ecosystems instead of just plugging into global ones. But history isn’t exactly kind to TikTok challengers: most fail because creators go where the audience already is. UrbanTok’s bet is different: don’t out-algorithm TikTok, out-local it. Whether that’s enough to pull creators and brands away from a platform that already works is the real question. The launch was the easy part. Now comes the hard one: building a platform people actually stay on.
Somalia is quietly building its cybersecurity rulebook
Somalia is doing something you don’t often see in the headlines: quietly building the backbone of a digital state. On April 25, 2026, in Mogadishu, the National Communications Authority (NCA) pulled together government agencies, telecom operators, universities, and civil society for a national consultation on a new Cybersecurity Risk Management and Compliance Framework. Think of it as the rulebook that will make the country’s recently passed cybersecurity law actually work in practice, defining who is responsible for what, how risks are tracked, and how breaches are handled as Somalia’s digital economy grows.
This isn’t about passing new laws; that part is already done. Somalia’s parliament approved the Cybersecurity Law on January 26, 2026, followed by the launch of the national incident response team (SOMCIRT) in early March. A few weeks later, the government rolled out cybersecurity training programmes with backing from the World Bank. What’s happening now is the next layer: turning all of that into a system that can actually be enforced. In short, Somalia is building its cybersecurity stack step by step — law, team, training, and now compliance.
The urgency is hard to ignore. In 2025, a breach of Somalia’s e-visa platform exposed sensitive personal data, underlining just how vulnerable government systems still are. The country currently ranks in Tier 4 of the ITU’s Global Cybersecurity Index, near the bottom, even as its telecom sector pushes forward with things like 5G rollouts. That mismatch is risky. You can’t expand digital infrastructure without strengthening the systems protecting it, and right now Somalia is trying to catch up fast.
What’s striking is how quickly this has come together. In just three years, Somalia has rolled out a data protection law (2023), pushed a cybercrime bill (2025), passed a full cybersecurity law (January 2026), and signed multiple international partnerships to build capacity. The regulator itself has also secured global certifications around security and data protection, not something you’d typically associate with a country still rebuilding its institutions. It’s a deliberate sprint to close a very real gap.
Interestingly, this could go two ways. On one hand, it’s a bold attempt to leapfrog into a secure digital future the same way Somalia once leapfrogged into mobile money. On the other hand, the infrastructure is expanding in a country where enforcement capacity is still uneven and where security challenges haven’t disappeared. Writing the rules is one thing. Making them stick is another. Somalia has started the process. Now it has to prove it can follow through.
In case you missed it
What I’m watching
Opportunities
- Flutterwave is hiring for several roles in Nigeria, the UK, and the US. Apply here.
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Have a fun weekend!
Victoria Fakiya for Techpoint Africa