Telecommunication sector shows strength

As the country celebrates 54 years of independence Wednesday, and 15 years of uninterrupted democracy, the nation’s telecommunication sector has witnessed a tremendous change and achievements during the democratic period.

The sector is adjudged an indispensable catalyst for the development of all other sectors in the country.

The democratically elected government in 1999 showed keen interest in the full liberalisation of the telecommunication sector.

The licensing of the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) by the Obasanjo administration saw three firms emerged, ECONET Wireless Nigeria, Mobile Telephone Networks (MTN) Communications and M-Tell Nigeria.

The new GSM licences, which were awarded for a period of

$20bn undersea cable investment failing to deliver

Four years after the landing of broadband fibre-optic submarine cables, which are supposed to ease the long standing constraints of internet penetration and bandwidth, the expected upgrading of Nigeria’s e-governance, education and healthcare,and others, continue to suffer on account of poor access, especially in the hinterland.

Four cable systems that landed the country have been virtually stranded on the coastline, unable to deliver service to the hinterland, due to the under-developed distribution networks, including national long distance fibre, metro fibre and lastmile connectivity, required to push internet services in-land.

The federal government had set the target of a five-fold increase in broadband penetration, in consonance with the National Broadband Plan (NBP).

The purpose of this is to