President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria
First draft produced
June 2021
We harmonise existing laws/regulations and feed input to the legal framework from key ecosystem leaders (MDAs, States, Networks).
First draft validated
July 2021
The first draft of the bill is reviewed by ecosystem leaders and representatives, as well as the Presidential Working Group composed of MDA decision-makers critical to implementing components of the bill.
Town Halls
August 2021
The presidential announcement and town hall meetings take place for public consultation and validation of the second draft of the bill. This sees the participation of ecosystem stakeholders at the state level in all geopolitical zones.
Final Draft Produced
September 2021
Drafting teams take all the input and make revisions to feed into the final bill.
Bill Submitted
October 2021
The bill is submitted to the President who then submits Executive Bill to the National Assembly.
Assembly floor
December 2021
The bill is sent to the National Assembly.
Public Hearing
June 2022
The National Assembly holds a public hearing of the bill
Bill Passed
July 2022
The National Assembly passes the Nigerian Startup Bill.
Bill becomes Act
October 2022
The Nigeria Startup Bill receives presidential assent to become the Nigeria Startup Act (NSA).
The Nigeria Startup Act is targeted at fostering the creation and development of an enabling environment for technology-enabled startups in Nigeria and for related matters.
Here you can have your say on the Act, indicating challenges yet to be addressed, propose additional policy solutions or propose amendments to specific articles.
Call:
The Nigeria Startup Act project is a joint initiative by Nigeria’s tech ecosystem and the Presidency to harness the potential of our digital economy through co-created regulations. While this is our act; it is being project managed by the Ventures Platform Foundation and supervised by the Presidential Strategic Advisory Group composed of stakeholder representatives from the tech-startup ecosystem in Nigeria.
By jointly reviewing the drafts of the act and giving your inputs. You can participate by clicking on here
We plan that this act is submitted to the NASS by October and passed by 2021. Visit the project timeline and subscribe to the newsletter to follow the journey.
Yes. Other African countries like Senegal and Tunisia have passed their own startup bills.
We are adopting a collaborative approach to drive this cause. We have tagged this collaborative framework the Big Tent approach, which in other words, means the bill is owned by the ecosystem. The process of engagement involves all relevant stakeholders in the startup ecosystem including the government (both at regional and federal levels, as well as across the legislative, executive and judiciary arms of government to develop and submit the bill to be signed into law. This is an initiative together with #i4Policy, and, is being supported by the Innovation for Policy Foundation, an organization working to increase public policy co-creation that has experience in facilitating the co-design of startup policy and legislative frameworks in more than a dozen African countries. We are also identifying existing laws/regulations and harmonising them into this bill. We are also using the bill as an opportunity to update existing but outdated laws.
Country Director, UK-Nigeria Tech Hub
CMO / MTN
Managing Partner, GrandCentral
SSA (Country Risk Assessment and Evaluation) to the President, Federal Republic of Nigeria
Managing Partner, Utopia, Lagos
SA (Innovation) to the Vice President, Federal Republic of Nigeria
Founder / Future Africa
Head of Compliance / Smile Identity
Director / API
Founder / Ventures Platform
Founding Partner, LoftyInc Capital Management
Founder / Startup Arewa
CEO / Teasy International
Founder, Iba Ajie hub, Africa Soft Power Project
SSA (Strategic Communications) to The President, Federal Republic of Nigeria
SSA (Digital Transformation) to The President, Federal Republic of Nigeria. Lead, Nigeria Startup Act
Founder / CoLab
Policy Lead / Google West Africa
CEO / Big Cabal Media
Executive Director & Lead Researcher / API
Project Manager, Nigeria Startup Act
Group Executive Director, Commercial Tangerine Africal