Broadcasting
MultiChoice, Others Reject Senate’s Pay-Per-View DSTV Subscription Model
MultiChoice Nigeria and major stakeholders in the pay television broadcasting industry in the country have rejected a pay-per-view model advocated by the Senate.
Major cable television providers in the country currently operate the monthly subscription model.
The stakeholders said that the PPV model being canvassed by the Senate is not feasible.
MultiChoice and stakeholders in the sector made the assertions at a one-day public hearing organised by the Senate Ad-Hoc Committee investigating “Pay-Tv hikes and demand for the pay-per-view subscription model in Nigeria,” in Abuja.
The Committee was chaired by Deputy Senate Whip Senator Aliyu Sabi Abdullahi.
Some members of the panel present at the session include Senators Michael Nnachi, Suleiman Abdul Kwari and Abba Moro, who moved the motion for the Senate to investigate the incessant price hike by cable television operators in the country.
Mr. John Ugbe, Chief Executive Officer, MultiChoice Nigeria, in his presentation,said several legal and legislative moves made to compel the firm to operate pay-per-view model did not work because it was not feasible.
Ugbe said: “Whilst it may appear to be a noble intent for this Committee to be concerned over the rising cost of subscription services; however, the Pay-Per-View (PPV) model being canvassed by this Committee will not work either to the benefit of the consumer or the industry.
“It would appear that this problem is because of some confusion in understanding the basic definitions and distinctions between some of the existing operational business models in telecommunications and pay-tv broadcasting.
“A pay-per-view (PPV) is not the same and is very different from Pay-As-You-Go (PAYG).
“The PPV model allows a subscriber to watch some special one-off events, usually of the high-ticket variety in sports and entertainment, by paying for such events in addition to having an active subscription.
“Pay-As-You-Go, accommodates a metered mode of service, where consumers are billed only for the service they consume and not for a fixed period.
“The desire by this Committee to adopt PPV is further challenged by the non-existence of any technology that can detect and or determine the viewers are tuned in per time.
“Once it is impossible to have this knowledge, billings based on ‘per view’ become difficult if not almost impossible.
“It is therefore my humble submission to this distinguished committee that due to the nature of content acquisition and technological limitations that PAYG model is not practical for broadcasting and thus is not practiced and basically cannot be implemented anywhere in the world.”
On the issue of incessant price increases by MultiChoice, Ugbe attributed the development to several factors including inflation, programming content cost, broadcast transmission facilities and massive investment to innovate and keep up with technological changes.
Other factors, according to him, are anti-piracy costs, security costs, marketing and operational costs, exchange rate fluctuations, tax, regulatory fees, and cumulative national and local levies.
“Some of the adverse economic factors highlighted above have not only affected the subscription prices for pay-tv, but have generally led to substantial increments in the pricing of a wide range of goods and services ranging from essential commodities like food, transportation, clothing, healthcare, educational services to other consumer goods like petrol, building materials, cars, etc,” Ugbe said.
On his part, a former Director General of the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC), Emeka Mba, said the issues of Pay-Per-View (PPV) and Pay-TVpricing, does not amount to an important regulatory problem worthy of Senate’s intervention.
Mba: “As Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, Professor Malcom Sparrow famously said in his book ‘The Regulatory Craft’, Regulators should pick important problems and fix them.’
“In my humble opinion it appears that the issues being addressed today, does not reflect or amount to an important regulatory problem.
“Whilst it may appear worrying that pay Tv services subscription charges are increasing, this must be seen within the larger economic window of rising inflation, cost of living and exchange rate challenges that is faced by every sector of the economy.
“For instance, the prices of almost every item on every family’s grocery list have increased significantly, based on the realities of demand and supply occasioned by the economic factors mentioned above.”
Besides, the Chief Executive Officer of TSTV, Dr. Bright Echefu and Chief Operating Officer of Startimes, Tunde Aina, however said even if a PPV model is not feasible, Cable TV operators could adopt pay per day models to lessen the pains of poor subscribers.
Echefu said, “Pay-Per-View is not feasible but we came up with pay per day. We also allow our subscribers to choose the package based on the numbers of channels they wanted to watch.”
The Chairman’ of the Committee, Sabi Abdullahi, in his opening remarks, said the Senate constituted the panel following a motion on the subject matter approved at plenary.
He said the motion stated that various packages of the MultiChoice bouquet had been increased by 80 per cent in the last five years.
Abdullahi said the development was not in the best interest of the subscribers especially when a Court had cautioned the MultiChoice Nigeria against carrying out its latest increment which it introduced on March 30 this year.
He assured the stakeholders that the Senate had not taken a position on the matter and that the report would be based on the memorandum they submitted to the panel.
The Leader of the Senate, Ibrahim Gobir, who represented the Senate President, urged the stakeholders to be frank in their presentations so as to enable the Senate come up with recommendations that would be in the interest of all.
Abba Moro, who moved the motion, said he believed that the pay-tv should be considerate in their bouquet pricing.
According to him, the MultiChoice, which is the operator of DSTV and GOTV, has over two million subscribers.
He recounted the firm’s many price increment since 2009 till date.
Moro said: “MultiChoice increase prices without recource to the economic reality without adopting the pay-per-view.
“DSTV, GOTV will be raping Nigerians if they consistently shunned the pay-per-view model which could ameliorate the hardship being faced by the subscribers.”
However, the Deputy Director, Research and Policy at the National Broadcasting Commission, Mr. Aneke Stan Onyebuchi, who represented the Director General said the agency had no enabling law to either regulate or control the incessant price increases by cable television operators in the country.
Onyebuchi said, “There are negative reactions whenever MultiChoice incresases its price and the NBC is concerned.
“However, the NBC Act only gives it power to receive, consider and investigate complaints regarding broadcast contents. Nowhere in the Act was the NBC given powers to regulate the prices being charged on their services.”
He, therefore urged the National Assembly to amend the NBC Act to give it powers to regulate prices in the industry.
The Director, Tax Policy and Advisory, Federal Inland Revenue Service, Temitayo Orebajo, said cable TV operators are concerned about making profits despite the harsh operational environment.
He said, “The MultiChoice for instance, expresses fears that replacing monthly billing with pay-per view, will reduce their revenues.
“However, the FIRS believes that the migration will not affect their income, rather they would get more subscribers.”
The representative of the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Abubakar Ladan, stressed the need to amend the NBC Act to enable the agency sanction erring Cable TV operators.
He said, “We need to review the NBC Act in response to the dynamic and reality on ground, in the interest of the poor subscribers.”
Ladan, who is the Director/ Secretary, Frequency Management Council, said the ministry was doing everything to protect the interest of Nigerians.
Festus Sanmi Onifade, subscriber and legal practitioner, has withdrawn his lawsuit challenging alleged unfair price hikes by MultiChoice Nigeria Limited, filed at the Federal High Court in Abuja.
Also listed as a defendant in the suit is the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC).
In a notice of discontinuance, dated April 1, 2025, the claimant formally informed the court of his decision to wholly withdraw the suit, marked FHC/ABJ/CS/363/2025.
However, the notice, signed by Onifade, did not advance reasons for the withdrawal.
Onifade had earlier approached the court to challenge what he described as an unfair and unjust price increase announced by MultiChoice Nigeria, slated to take effect from March 15, 2025.
In the originating summons, he asked the court to determine, among other things, whether, given Section 128 of the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Act, 2018, and other relevant laws, the notice of the impending price increase issued by the first defendant was not unfair, unjust, grossly inadequate and a breach of his consumer rights; whether, considering the subsisting appeal in MultiChoice Nigeria Ltd & Ors v. Festus Onifade & Ors, the defendant was not stopped from further increasing the price of its services.
The suit centred on legal tussle between Onifade and MultiChoice over price hikes, which the claimant insisted were being implemented in defiance of regulatory standards and without adequate consumer engagement.
Uche Nnaji, minister of Innovation, Science and Technology, has, said that the federal government has been exploring measures to curb the growing exploitation of satellite technologies, lamenting that Starlink, DStv, and a few other service providers pay ‘peanuts’ to operate in Nigeria.
According to him, some foreign investors have been known to find a way to bypass the system and deprive the government of its mandatory revenues.
The minister made the revelation at a stakeholders’ Workshop on Space Regulation organised by the National Space Research and Development Agency (NASRDA) in Abuja.
Addressing the gathering, Nnaji noted that if the regulation of space is properly handled, it would not only boost revenue, it will also whittle down the growing activities of pipeline vandals, insurgents and criminal groups.
He said, “In the near future, we will move from the $ 1 trillion economy to $ 5 trillion. So with this space regulation and licensing. Starlink and most of them, including DSTV will come here, some will pay peanuts and shortchange Nigerians. These are part of what we want to address through this space regulation and license.
“You can be sure that yearly, if we are going by what my capacity DG of NASRDA has said, we will be looking at over N200 billion annually, with annual increment of 18-20 per cent. This is just one of the initiatives coming out of the agency.”
Continuing, Nnaji said the era of satellite pay-tv or radio losing signal when it is raining will soon be a thing of the past.
The minister said they have discovered some service providers are not operating on the right bandwidths hence the loss of signal when there is a change in weather.
“All these challenges of your TV or radio not working or losing signal whenever it is raining are because the DSTV and the likes are not hosting their equipment at the right bandwidth. They will host it at the lower bandwidth, where they will not spend money on the higher bandwidth.
“But with the regulation, we will force them to move it up to where it’s supposed to be. Because if you move it up to where it’s supposed to be, you won’t have any of those problems of losing signal as soon as it starts raining. So this is part of the many reforms that are going on under this very capable man, Dr. Olumide Adepoju.
Federal government has announced its target of generating over $20bn annually from Nigeria’s rapidly evolving space economy, leveraging a newly launched space security platform and comprehensive regulatory reforms.
Speaking at the launch event in Abuja on Tuesday, Chief Uche Geoffrey Nnaji, minister of Innovation, Science and Technology, unveiled the government’s strategic plans to capitalize on space technologies for national revenue generation, particularly in key sectors like oil monitoring and maritime surveillance.
“With space-based surveillance, we can detect vessels entering Nigerian waters—even those that switch off their transponders to evade detection. We’ll be able to track them, ensure compliance, and collect the appropriate fees. This initiative alone could yield over $20 billion annually,” he said.
The Minister emphasised that Nigeria’s space economy is no longer a futuristic dream but a present-day economic lever.
“Space is no longer the domain of dreamers alone—it is now the frontier of serious business, innovation, and national security,” he declared.
“Our task is clear: to establish a transparent, well-regulated ecosystem where public and private actors—from startups to established institutions—can thrive,” he added.
The new space security platform is tied to the enforcement of Nigeria’s 2015 Regulations on the Licensing and Supervision of Space Activities.
Section 4(1), mandates that no one “shall carry out activities to which the Regulations apply except under the authority of a license granted by the National Space Council.”
These regulations aim to hold local and foreign operators—such as Starlink and DSTV—accountable under Nigerian law.
“Currently, some pay appropriate fees, while others contribute minimally, shortchanging Nigerians. This new regulatory framework will address that imbalance,” Nnaji stated.
Dr. Matthew Adepoju, director general, National Space Research and Development Agency (NASRDA), echoed the Minister’s sentiments, highlighting the economic, security, and youth empowerment potential of the sector.
“Nigeria must remain a forward-thinking nation. We must ensure that space activities within our jurisdiction are properly regulated, commercially optimized, and aligned with international best practices,” Adepoju said.
According to NASRDA, Nigeria can generate about N200bn annually from space-related activities, with potential growth rates of 18–20 per cent per year.
The workshop, which gathered key stakeholders from government, academia, and the private sector, marks a pivotal shift in Nigeria’s approach to space as a tool for development.
It also underscores the urgency to reform existing legal frameworks.
Dr. Olisa Agbakoba, legal expert, who also spoke at the event, criticized Nigeria’s outdated space laws.
“Our current laws are outdated. The NASRDA Act is not a true space law. We need a clear economic strategy for space, legal reform, and an updated National Space Policy,” he said.
Agbakoba proposed creating a Center for Space Law and emphasized that space should contribute at least 2% to Nigeria’s GDP.
“Let’s learn from countries like the UAE. Why not aim for Nigerian astronauts—male and female?” he asked.
Mrs. Esuabana Asanye, permanent secretary of the Ministry, while unveiling the new NASRDA logo, positioned the current phase as a new era in Nigeria’s space journey: “We are now turning the page from the first 25 years, and ushering in a new era—one that will redefine Nigeria’s presence in space.”
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