…Industry Applauds
By Aaron Ukodie
Former Minister of Communication Technology, under the Goodluck Jonathan administration, Dr Omobola Johnson, lit the Eko Hall, venue of the first Nigerian Telecom Leadership Summit, with her insightful and forward looking call for a digital revolution to sustain the gains of the telecom revolution for Nigeria to remain relevant in the now emerging digital world.
The revolution that Omobola calls for would be needed to be supported by new ways of looking at regulation, adding that “the role of the regulator need to change from a licensor and enforcer of level playing field to that of an enabler of infrastructure building”.
She added that there should also be an enabling environment that encourages huge capital outlay that is in multiples of $14 billion that achieved the telecom revolution during her time.
Her call for a digital revolution addresses the digital economy and encompassing innovations that deal with exportable talent and skill creations, and the building of digital infrastructures that connects everyone to digital signals. This infrastructure is what is needed now to enable Artificial Intelligence, 5G Networks and creation of Smart Cities across the land.
According to her current talks should centre on how new investments in infrastructure, technology, talents and skills and innovations would allow Nigeria to leapfrog.
“We need to look beyond statistics to how we build the digital infrastructure… how it should be funded…
“We need software engineers and exportable skills that are built around digital infrastructure. We need to look at reliability (of networks and technologies). We should redefine our infrastructure in a more different way and the cost of data. We need to get pricing right and then talk of accessibility”.
“We need an infrastructure that is ubiquitous, reliable, and affordable and fast”, according to her.
She said Nigeria now needs a private and public partnership arrangement that creates the framework to achieve the blended capital needed to achieve broadband ubiquity. The infrastructure “is not good enough and services are insatiable”.
“I cannot think of any single model of our national aspiration; anything we are trying to do that is not going to be dependent on investment on technology and the infrastructure that enables it”, Omobola said.
The regulator must be ahead of the industry and it should be more engaging and collaborative, embracing such new tech-entrepreneurs, ensuring licensing is faster for emerging players in the new emerging tech-generation.
She asked if the regulator, was a policeman or revenue collector or a growth-enabler. She answered by saying that the regulator should be a facilitator and an enabler, demanding that the role of the NCC should be broadened and it should be more collaborative.
She was emphatic,“ if we do not go digital we will die…We need to leapfrog now, from where we are now, to where we should be”, adding that in the new world nations are ranked and described based on technology acquisition and deployment.
She got an applause from an appreciative industry whose players went on to queue behind her.
There is need for continued investment because of new technologies and investors are watching if the regulatory and policy environment is conducive for them, according the ATCON’s Gbenga Adebayo.
“We are not focusing on the type of investment that would come in… there should be deliberate strategies to enable new entrants to come in and grow”, Mainone’s Funke Opeke added, saying that Nigeria needs to attract the right foreign direct investment, while the regulator should provide level playing field and protection for value-added services and local players.
“ We need to have a new framework by thinking digital, what needs to happen ( for us) to play in the new digital ecosystem” Opeke added.
Nigeria is unduly afraid of private capital investment and if we have to get the $ 100 billion that Nigeria needs to grow its infrastructure in the next three decades private capital investment of about $30 billion the country needs to attracted and retained, Dr Doyin Salami, of Lagos Business School added.
The eWorld Forum
The eWorld Forum, slated to hold on June 10, at the Oriental Hotels, Lekki, provides another opportunity for industry players to further accentuate Omobola’s call for a new digital revolution. Coincidentally, the eWorld Forum is reputed to be a leading platform where new visions are birthed and given form and reality.
According to Aaron Ukodie, publisher of eWorldNews, organisers of the eWorld Forum, it was at the maiden edition of the Forum in 2009 that the idea for a Broadband Strategy was muted, a call that has now become a reality with the framing of a broadband vision and master plan for Nigeria.
The forum has Roadmap to Broadband Everywhere as theme with sub themes dealing with artificial Intelligence, 5G, Smart Cities, Infracos and connectivity.
