The Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission has come out to respond via a statement to a series of newspaper publication and a viral anonymous post in the social media that “seek to create the impression that the Commission cancelled, shut down, or banned airtime borrowing and data advance services in Nigeria”.
The Commission tagged those claims as “incorrect”. It said, it “has not prohibited airtime borrowing or data advance services, and no directive was issued preventing consumers from accessing lawful telecom value-added services”.
The FCCPC said, the DEON Consumer Lending Regulations was issued in July, 2025 after a “deluge” of complaints from customers concerning “opaque charges, unexplained deductions, aggressive recovery practices, poor disclosure standards, and inadequate accountability in segments of the digital lending and advance-services market”.
In the statement released on Friday 17 April, 2026, the FCCPC said, the regulations were issued “to curb the excesses of abusive service providers whose practices had generated persistent consumer harm and undermined confidence in the market”.
It added, “the primary aim is to promote a fairer and more transparent system by mandating proper registration, responsible lending conduct, clear disclosure of fees and terms, accessible consumer complaint channels, data protection safeguards, stronger accountability for third-party partners, and effective regulatory oversight.”
The measures taken by the Commission will be beneficial to Nigerians to ensure “abusive practices” are lowered, as well as, “improve transparency, strengthen consumer choice and encourage responsible innovation by legitimate operators”.
It said, any provisional suspension should not be seen as a ban by the FCCPC but as a “business or compliance decision”.
The FCCPC said in the statement, “any temporary suspension, restriction, or operational change introduced by service providers should therefore be understood as a business or compliance decision by those operators, not a ban imposed by the FCCPC.”
It advised consumers and members of the public to disregard “false and misleading” stories on the matter.
