The deal between Nigeria and Meta, details of which have not been previously disclosed, is replete with concessions by Nigeria, including writing off the $32.8 million fine and softening the obligations it earlier imposed on Meta.
In February 2025, Nigeria announced a $32.8 million fine for data privacy violations against Meta Platform Inc., the parent company of Facebook and Instagram. But the government went quiet when it reversed course by writing off the fine after striking a deal with the tech giant in October last year.
In return for Nigeria writing off the fine, which resulted from about 17 months of investigation by the Nigeria Data Protection Commission (NDPC), Meta pledged to be ethical in the handling of Nigerians data in the future.
The tech company bore no financial liability except agreeing to offset the legal fees Nigeria incurred in the court case it instituted to challenge NDPC’s “Final Orders.”
When Nigeria imposed the fine last year, it joined a growing list of countries, including the United States, the United Kingdom, and the European Union (EU), that have slapped Meta and other tech companies with significant fines over data privacy breaches and other safety risks their platforms expose users to.
The companies have been forced to regularly address policy gaps to better guarantee data privacy and address safety concerns associated with exposures on social media platforms. Governments have also updated their laws and regulations and increased scrutiny to keep up with emerging threats, strengthening compliance and enforcement.
Nigeria’s move was seen as a landmark step and one of the first of its kind in Africa. But the confidence it stirred slumped when Nigeria reversed the sanctions last year.
“Regulatory action is strongest when there is a clear finding of a breach, backed by penalties and the risk of further sanctions. Setting aside the earlier orders removed that weight, leaving the commitments with little additional force,” said Iliya-Ezekiel Ndatse, a data protection lawyer.
Nigeria, through the NDPC, signed a settlement agreement with Meta on 30 October 2025, details of which have not been previously reported, to forgo the $32.8 million fine in the Final Orders the agency issued against the company on 18 February 2025.
PREMIUM TIMES has now obtained the certified true copies of the settlement agreement entered into by the NPDC and Meta and the consent judgement given on 3 November 2025 by the Federal High Court in Abuja based on the deal.
Media outlets, including PREMIUM TIMES, reported the delivery of the judgement in November last year, but not the details of the agreement.
Months after the NPDC entered into the agreement and the court gave it a judicial stamp, the agency and the government have continued to keep the details to themselves.
The development is a reminder of the fog of secrecy that, to date, envelopes the deal the Nigerian government claimed to strike with Twitter (now X) in the aftermath of the ban on the platform in Nigeria in June 2021.
Exercising its powers under the Nigeria Data Protection Act, 2023 (NDP Act), the NPDC, Nigeria’s data governing agency, launched an investigation on 20 September 2023 into Meta’s activities in Nigeria.
The probe centred on Meta’s alleged breaches of Nigeria’s data protection laws and the privacy rights of over 60 million Nigerian data subjects.
NPDC and Meta exchanged written communications, and their representatives met in person multiple times during the investigations.
After 17 months of the probe, NPDC issued its “Final Orders” on 18 February 2025, which outlined sweeping findings and remedial directives.
The commission said it found that Meta “did not seek express, specific and unambiguous consent” from users for behavioural advertising.
It also ordered a stop to the transfer of Nigerians’ personal data outside the country without approval, the collection of non-users’ data, and the company’s use of algorithms, which “could expose data subjects to health and financial risks.”
To safeguard Nigerians’ data privacy and rights, NPDC ordered Meta to obtain proper user consent, conduct a Data Processing Impact Assessment on the human rights and democratic impacts of its systems, and update its privacy policy to reflect the risks posed by profiling.
NPDC also ordered the company to stop transferring data abroad without NDPC approval, cease collecting non-users’ data, and provide educational tools on the dangers of unlawful data processing.
The commission further directed the company to ensure fair access for Nigerian users and businesses, implement adequate technical and organisational safeguards for data protection, and pay the Naira equivalent of $32.8 million as a remedial fee.
However, following the NDPC’s final orders and notice, Meta filed a legal challenge to the sanctions at the Federal High Court in Abuja and even threatened to shut down its operations in Nigeria.
On 4 March 2025, the company’s lawyer, Fred Onuofia, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), urged Judge James Omotosho to grant an interim order staying the enforcement of NPDC’s final orders.
However, the judge turned down the request and opted to hear all parties out once and for all.
Following this, Meta filed the substantive suit on 19 March 2025, alleging that the NDPC had denied it a fair hearing and due process. It sought to quash the enforcement orders, which it said breached its right to a fair hearing under section 36 of the Nigerian constitution.
In response, the NDPC filed a preliminary objection, contending that the suit was incompetent and that the court lacked jurisdiction to hear it.
On 3 October, when the court was to deliver its decision, both parties disclosed that they had agreed to end the dispute amicably.
Within one month, they hammered out a settlement agreement dated 30 October 2025, which they filed in court the next day. The document was signed by Babatunde Bamigboye, NDPC’s Head of Legal, Enforcement and Regulations, and Anna Benckert, Meta’s Vice President and Associate General Counsel, International Legal. The parties’ lawyers also signed the document, with Fred Onuobia, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), representing Meta, and Adeola Adedipe, also a SAN, representing NDPC.
On 3 November 2025, the court adopted the settlement agreement as a consent judgement, effectively writing off the $32.8 million awarded in the Final Orders as “a remedial fee.”
