Nigeria is telecom investors’ haven, says NCC
Umar Danbatta, NCC Boss.
The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has assured international and potential investors that Nigeria remains a sure haven for Information and Communications Technology (ICT) investors with over 107 per cent teledensity for voice segment of telecommunications services already achieved.
According to NCC quarterly magazine, its Executive Vice Chairman, Prof Umar Danbatta, gave this assurance during a panel discussion in Spain.
Danbatta assured the international community that the NCC’s eight-point agenda had been carefully packaged to cushion all aspects of investments, especially “as we move to the next frontier of ICT revolution broadband for Internet connectivity.”
He said that NCC would keep fate with the National Broadband Plan, adding that in line with this, the country now had seven zones and each zone would have one operator that would deploy broadband services to every part of that zone.
He noted: “So far, two infrastructure licences have been issued for Lagos and North Central zones, including the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja.
“And the process for issuing licences for the other five zones has begun.
“The regulatory framework has been put in place to ensure a transparent licencing process, because we really want to bridge the digital divide by addressing the infrastructure divide and we will be transparent and open about this.”
He stated that NCC unfolded strategies to promote universal access to support market driven communications, adding: “NCC has adopted a number of Internet-related projects and initiatives for its strategic management plan.
“Some of these plans are ongoing while some are proposed or planned for future dates.”
According to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), Danbatta listed these to include provision of online portal for stakeholder consultation, development of infrastructure database to link Regional Internet Code of Conduct and development of National Registry Database. (NAN)
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1 Comments
Before Traditional mobile networks operators in Nigeria pushes NCC to kill the OTT start up providers in Nigeria!
Traditional mobile networks in Nigeria such as MTN, GLO, ETISALAT etc appears to centre their argument on suggestion that OTT providers use infrastructure for (in) which they do not pay (invest), and that they are therefore “free-riding” on expensive assets built by the operators. There has also been some argument that OTT providers are not sufficiently regulated. Hence NCC is planning to regulate a one side regulation which we harm the SME and OTT start up company in Nigeria. In as much regulating OTT services is very important due to security issue, NCC must do this inconsideration to all providers and not mentioning anyway that OTT providers are threat to Traditional mobile networks .
Countries of the world like USA, Canada, UK etc are doing wonderfully well since OTT is well regulated to suite all players.
The question is whether there is merit to these arguments, or whether these claims simply represent the mobile operators’ attempts to frustrate competition from more technologically advanced forms of communication.
First of all, let’s deal with the argument that OTT providers are free-riding on the operators’ infrastructure.
Anybody that uses the range of OTT providers (anything from WhatsApp to Skype) on their mobile devices (and through mobile networks) will know that there is a cost attached to doing this. Specifically, the users of these services pay the mobile networks in the form of data charges every time a message is sent and received. And, as opposed to traditional mobile and text communication, in these cases both the sender and recipient pay data charges.
So, while the cost of communication may be lower for each individual party, it is important to remember that both parties pay mobile operators when using OTT services. Ultimately, users are paying for the use of the network operators’ infrastructure through data charges.
NCC Please consider Start up and SME as you do this.
Engr J.E Enoh
We will review and take appropriate action.