NCC explains broadband investment drive in Dubai

PAUCITY of investment in the broadband sector of the Nigerian telecommunications industry is strong reason why the country wants to showcase its broadband potential at the International Telecommunications Union 2012, according to the Executive Vice Chairman of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), Dr. Eugene Juwah.Juwah said at the weekend that Nigeria has made sizeable progress in GSM and voice telephony, but Internet penetration is still a far cry, as many people have had to contend with high cost of bandwidth from the few broadband operators in the country.According to Juwah, many corporate organisations, high networth individuals and even ministries, departments and Agencies have had to depend largely on imported bandwidth by foreign operators until recently when MainOne, Glo 1 and NigComSat 1R began to offer broadband services, but even at that because of the high investment profile of these organizations, the cost of acquiring bandwidth by Nigerians has not come down very significantly, reason why more investors are needed, especially in the areas of Foreign Direct Investment to cushion the pains and high cost of acquisition of the essential instrument that can quickly expand internet availability in the nooks and cranies of Nigeria.The latest ITU broadband enabled and Internet to home ranking put Nigeria at 87 out of 127 countries surveyed and 4.6 per cent penetration against a world average of 20.5 per cent.Nigeria currently ranks behind economies including Egypt; Tunisia; Namibia and South Africa among others.The EVC said that in reality, only urban and semi-urban centres of the country can today boast of access to the Internet.According to him, a larger part of the population, which resides in the rural areas are grossly underserved, 'again this is not acceptable. So we really need investors to help expand the process in the country.'The NCC boss reiterated that though so much progress had been made in voice telephony but data aspect of the sector was still poor and far between, adding that indeed, operators in Nigeria spend an average of between $400m and $500m yearly on bandwidth imported from Foreign Service providers and this has accumulative negative effect on the end users who have no choice but bear the high cost of this all important tool for fast Internet speed and data transmission.Juwah indicated that the theme of the country's participation at the ITU World is: 'Nigeria Broadband ' A Connected Nation', adding that the country will use the occasion to assure the international community of Nigeria's readiness to protect investments and promote competition in the spirit of deregulation and private sector participation will canvass this point.
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