Broadband will not solve Nigeria’s telecoms problems – Expert

Ofulue who is also a former General Manager of Operations of the moribund Nigerian Telecommunications Limited (NITEL) was among the key industry stakeholders who gathered at the weekend at a stakeholders forum in Lagos, organised by the Nigerian Communications Commission to unfold plans for a neutral wholesale provider of fibre optic links to other service […]

Ofulue who is also a former General Manager of Operations of the moribund Nigerian Telecommunications Limited (NITEL) was among the key industry stakeholders who gathered at the weekend at a stakeholders forum in Lagos, organised by the Nigerian Communications Commission to unfold plans for a neutral wholesale provider of fibre optic links to other service providers.
The university don faulted the national broadband policy noting that there is need to carry out national backbone audit.
He said: “The open model architecture which model has being teaching for over 20years since I left NITEL is just a framework we should not be looking at the technology at all either it is satellite or optical fibre. So, I find it so disheartening after spending so 50years in telecommunications in Nigeria to come to such a gathering to hear us shouting broadband as if is something new. NITEL had broadband ring, optical ring from Marina to PortHarcout, from there to Enugu and from Enugu to Markudi, Markudi to Kaduna and from Kaduna to Ilorin and back to Lagos that is our optical ring that was a national backbone that how the open network should re-examine what we have on ground so that we know the value you adding on top can stay for a long time more than 2020. Secondly is that the national assembly should look into telecoms laws its lagging behind telecoms policy.”
To realize the country’s target of a five-fold increase in broadband penetration by 2017 as envisioned by the national broadband plan, the NCC plans to float an infrastructure company (InfraCos).
The Executive Vice Chairman of NCC, Dr. Eugene Juwah at a stakeholders forum in the document titled “Open Access Next Generation Fibre Optics Broadband Network Industry Consultation”, presented at the event disclosed that the InfraCos will also deploy metropolitan fibre and provide transmission services which would be available at access points (Fibre to the Node or Neighborhood – FTTN) to access seekers, leverage existing inter-city fibre to deploy their services.
According to him, the licensed InfraCos will roll out a national fibre optic network for broadband to boost high-speed Internet services across Nigeria.
He said the proposed InfraCo is expected to aggregate fibre optic links of other existing operators and will also get a one-off subsidy from government.
The EVC explained the idea is to have a neutral wholesale provider of fibre optic which is part of the government initiatives to achieve Next Generation Broadband Network (NBN) in Nigeria.
Juwah informed that under the initiative, the InfraCos will geographically provide wholesale bandwidth services on ‘a non-discriminatory, open access, price regulated basis’.
The EVC further stated that the InfraCos may emerge as a single national provider or several entities that will cater for the diverse regional markets across the country.
He also spoke of the commission’s plan to auction the remaining band in the 2.3GHZ spectrum to promote equal access to fibre links on open access basis to service providers.