Towards a Digital Sovereignty Framework for Nigeria: Critical Infrastructure Protection, Data Localisation, and Geopolitical Technology Dependencies

The concept of digital sovereignty, encompassing a nation-state's capacity to exercise autonomous control over its digital infrastructure, data flows, and technology supply chains, has emerged as a critical dimension of national security and development strategy. Nigeria's deepening dependence on foreign cloud infrastructure, submarine cable systems dominated by non-African entities, and imported telecommunications equipment has intensified debates about the country's digital sovereignty position. This study develops an original Digital Sovereignty Framework for Nigeria, triangulating insights from international relations theory, critical infrastructure protection scholarship, and postcolonial political economy. The research methodology combines a systematic review of digital sovereignty discourse across 85 academic and policy sources with structured expert interviews involving 42 technology policymakers, cybersecurity specialists, and telecommunications regulators from federal agencies and the private sector. Three empirical case analyses examine Nigeria's experience with the Nigerian Communications Satellite programme, the Central Bank of Nigeria's cloud data residency directive, and the Nigerian Content Development Monitoring Board's technology transfer provisions. The resulting framework articulates four sovereignty dimensions, namely infrastructure control, data governance, algorithmic independence, and digital trade reciprocity, and proposes a Sovereignty Vulnerability Index enabling quantitative benchmarking of Nigeria's position relative to comparable emerging economies. The study makes an original contribution to the nascent African digital sovereignty literature and provides a structured analytical tool for the Federal Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy's strategic planning processes. Keywords: digital sovereignty, critical infrastructure, data localisation, Nigeria, geopolitical technology dependence.