more than a decade after the liberalisation of the telecoms sector and the boom in subscriber figures, more than 200 rural communities spread across the six geo-political zones of Nigeria with about 36.8 million people still see telephony as a luxury. Mobile broadband internet access and its accompanying impacts on agriculture, health, e-commerce and education mean nothing to them. LUCAS AJANAKU reports on the need for the Nigeria Communication Commission (NCC) to live to its core mandate in this respect.
ABOUT 15 years ago, the Federal Government liberalised the telecoms sector, opening up a floodgate of investment. Subscribers’ figures have not only grown to more than 140 million according to the Nigeria Communications Commission (NCC), teledensity has passed 100 per cent.
With these developments have also come huge foreign direct investment (FDI) and a quantum leap in telecoms’ sector addition to the nation’s gross domestic product (GDP) estimated at 9.58 per cent. Total mobile internet subscription increased to 73.8million up from 45 million in 2011 as internet penetration increased to 52 per cent in September last year from about 26.5 per cent in September 2011.
E-commerce platforms such as Jumia, Konga, Phonekings.com and several others are taking advantage of the revolution to do good business.
The education sector is not left out as two firms, Cinfores Limited and WaveTek Nigeria Limited recently developed an e-learning application that will halt mass failure in the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board (JAMB) and Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME). In partnership with the National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), the two firms developed JAMB BrainFriend app.
These are but some of the innovations that have come with the telecoms revolution which has transformed the way people do business and live their lives. But most Nigerians who live in the rural areas have not been part of this revolution as they have remained ‘disenfranchised.’
The Federal Government recently identified over 207 subsidy clusters across the six geo-political zones of Nigeria where telecoms services are yet to reach.
A report of a study conducted by the USPF with the support of some independent consultants that included KPMG showed that 36.8million people are still living in the dark, completely cut off from the super highway of the telecoms revolution that swept across the country like a hurricane.
Nigeria is no doubt a huge country. According to recent figures from the National Population Commission (NPC), the country’s population stands at 167 million people with 36 states and 774 local government areas. It is against this backdrop and refusal of operators to invest in providing infrastructure to rural communities that the rural telephony initiative of the Federal Government becomes imperative.
According to figures from the NCC, subscriber figures have hit the 140 million mark. Majority of these subscribers live in the urban areas while a huge number of the rural populace remains disenfranchised. Therefore, the next frontier for expansion is obviously the rural areas where there are still more than 58 million willing but unconnected potential subscribers. EVC, NCC, Dr Eugene Juwah, said between 2001 and mid-2012, investment inflow into the nation’s telecoms industry increased from $500,000 to over $25 billion.
According to experts, community telephony would encourage the growth of the agricultural, extractive and manufacturing industries in the rural areas. Former Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Dr Akinwumi Adesina, says the ministry is partnering with the Ministry of Communications Technology to make about 10 million mobile phones available to rural farmers across the country as way of boosting agricultural production. Through this initiative, tractors, fertiliser, seeds and other farming inputs will be transmitted to the farmers through an e-wallet.
A National Rural Telephony Project (NRTP) was launched in 2001. The first phase of the project was to cover 218 local government areas and provide over 636,256 Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) lines in all the council areas as a way of bridging the digital divide.
The project was divided into three phases, and was estimated to cost $200 million. Key Communications Limited, Suburban Broadband Limited, Voicewares Network Limited, Gicell Wireless Limited, and Hezonic Limited were private sector service providers that were involved in the project while the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) concerning the project was signed with a Chinese firm.
The implementation of the project would have complemented the initiative of the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) to connect the world with technology by this year.
According to ITU, the Connect the World (Connecting the Unconnected) project by this year aims to mobilise human, financial, and technical resources for the implementation of the connectivity targets of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) and the Regional Initiatives, adopted by member states at the ITU World Telecommunication Development Conference.
The project, like every laudable project that directly impacts on the masses, was finally suspended in 2011. Aside the suspended rural telephony initiative, an intervention such as the Universal Service Provision Fund (USPF), established by the Communications Act of 2003, is geared towards promoting and facilitating ICT infrastructure in rural and underserved areas across the nation. It is expected to promote private sector investments, encourage competition, and give priority to self-sustaining programmes and projects. The USPF gets funding from the contribution of mobile operators who contribute 2.5 per cent of their profit to enable access to rural communities. With this kind of initiative, it is baffling that a large number of villages across the nation were yet to benefit from any form of telephony access.
But the trend has been for telecoms operators and investors to put a higher rate of investments in the urban areas and a lower margin in the rural areas. But to bridge this gap, telecoms and internet services need to be deployed more to the rural areas, since it’s now certain that the next phase of the telecoms communications growth will come from the rural areas.
Director of Regulatory Affairs, Etisalat Nigeria, Ibrahim Dikko, struck the right chord recently when he challenged the Federal Government to look for ways of funding the provision of telecoms infrastructure to rural areas as members of his contituency would not do that because of low returns on such investment
“Government would have to find ways to subsidise rural infrastructure build because operators most times, invest in areas that they consider commercially viable,” Dikko said.
Association of Telecoms Companies of Nigeria (ATCON) has urged the Federal Government to synergise with telecoms operators to resuscitate the moribund National Rural Telephony Project.
President of ATCON, Lanre Ajayi, said this was necessary since the government had been unable to implement the project while the rural communities had yet to feel the impact of the phenomenal growth in the telecoms sector.
“The Federal Government should support telecommunications providers to reach the under-reached and unserved areas through the USPF.
“In the implementation of rural telephony, government should provide operators stable power supply, accessible roads and improved security of telecoms infrastructures.
“Opening up the rural communities through integration into the national telephone networks will enhance exploitation of the economic potential of the communities and improve the standard of living of the rural dwellers,” Ajayi said.
MTN, had in 2010, launched a rural telephony initiative in partnership with equipment vendor, Huawei, in Lagos. How this initiative has improved telephone penetration in the country is not clear.
‘A report of a study conducted by the USPF with the support of some independent consultants that included KPMG showed that 36.8million people are still living in the dark, completely cut off from the super highway of the telecoms revolution that swept across the country like a hurricane’
