Oct. 18, 2023

…To increase broadband to 90% by 2025

The new Executive Vice-chairman (EVC) of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), Dr. Aminu Maida, says the pursuit of improved quality of service on the networks would be one of his priorities, as well as supporting the administration’s vision through the Ministry of Communications, Innovations and Digital Economy.

Maida said, “Considering the fact that many people are going more digital and virtual in everything they do, the telecom infrastructure is now under much stress.

The EVC stated this while interacting with NCC’s members of staff in Abuja on Wednesday.

He also said that he would align with the promises of President Bola Tinubu to advance the nation’s digital transformation agenda.

Maida noted there was the need to ensure that the NCC strategically focus on ensuring that all Nigerians’ access affordable and reliable broadband services.

He said part of this was to ensure effective broadband infrastructure diffusion across the length and breadth of Nigeria.

The new telecom regulator paid tributes to his predecessors for their laudable roles in building a resilient telecoms industry.

“President Tinubu’s vision emphasises the need to build more robust broadband connectivity that will not only facilitate seamless digital transactions but also serve as the bedrock for e-governance and other socio-economic initiatives.

“As such, we would align with this aspiration to increase broadband penetration to 70 per cent and to cover 90 per cent of the population by 2025.

“Therefore, we need to build a reliable telecom industry with impressive quality of service (QoS) indicators with quality of experience (QoE) as our watchword and ultimate goal.”

He said his tenure would address a number of issues such as the Right of Way (RoW) challenge, ensuring security of telecom infrastructure, among others.

Maida said efforts must be made to significantly improve service delivery by ensuring the NCC was performance-driven.

“Mr President has a very clear agenda from which all of us are going to take our direction. The two major areas are job creation and enabling the digital economy.

“Where we are going in a nutshell is; everything that we do in this Commission has to align directly with the Strategic Plan of the Minister of Communications, Innovations and Digital Economy.

“We will not entertain anything that deviates from this direction because my key performance indicators (KPIs) are fed into the Minister’s KPIs and the President KPIs come from the electorate that put him into power.”

“The Minister has said clearly that he is ready to build a robust digital infrastructure and empower three million Nigerians digitally and we have to do our best to support him in this regard,” he said.

Maida stated that in the Strategic Plan of the Minister, there was a plan to empower three million Nigerians in digital skills and entrepreneurship.

He said this would require the commission to support Digital Bridge Institute (DBI) as a digital training institution, to be well positioned in driving the government’s agenda on youth empowerment.

The EVC also emphasised the importance of effective spectrum management and utilisation in supporting the envisioned digital connectivity agenda.

This, Maida said, was critical to service deployment to the generality of Nigerians and businesses in the country.

He appreciated his predecessors and the entire staff of the commission for the laudable role being played in digital transformation of all sectors by stimulating the deployment of baseline telecom infrastructure.

The EVC called on the commission’s members of staff to join his leadership with a sense of purpose as a team towards advancing the actualisation of the president’s Renewed Hope Agenda.