USPF, NITDF to incentivise universal access

The two development funding organizations within the Federal Ministry of Communications Technology is currently being restructured to deploy incentivize the universal access for Nigerians.

These organs are the Universal Service Provision Fund (USPF) and the Nigeria Information Technology Development Fund (NITDF).

According to the Federal Minister in-charge of Communications Technology, Mrs. Omobola Johnson, the two funding arm of her ministry, USPF and NITDF would pave the way for a motivated stakeholder players by offering an incentive to boost universal access when the available funds within their reach is deployed to incentivize the sector at the end of the present restructuring going on in the new ministry.

Presenting a roadmap for the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Development (ICT4D) in the country at the 17th presidential investiture of Sir Demola Aladekomo-led presidency at the Nigeria Computer Society (NCS) in Lagos, recently, Mrs. Johnson noted that President Goodluck Jonathan responded to calls from concerned stakeholders for a Ministry of ICTs and created the new Ministry to utilize ICTs as a tool for national development.

She explained that the Ministry has five agencies under its supervision, including the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Nigerian Postal Service (NIPOST), Galaxy Backbone plc, and Nigerian Communications Satellite (NigComSAT) as well as two development funds organizations, which are USPF and NITDF.

Mrs. Johnson pointed out that the Universal Service Provision Fund and Nigeria IT Development Fund and the creation of the Ministry led to a revelation of overlaps and duplication in the roles of some of these agencies of government.

She reassured that the ongoing restructuring and refocusing of agencies under the Ministry will lead to clarity in terms of roles, responsibilities and accountability.

As said by her, in a bid to make the agencies under the Ministry more effective and to mitigate unnecessary duplications, they have been streamlined and realigned to their functions.

“The Nigerian Communications Commission NCC now regulates the ICT industry; NITDA provides IT support and development; NIPOST provides postal service delivery and access infrastructure while Galaxy Backbone is the vehicle for ICT infrastructure provision for federal government and its agencies and NigComSat is responsible for commercializing satellite bandwidth,” she said, even as the National Frequency Management Council NFMC facilitates prudent and co-ordinated allocation of frequency resources.

Additionally, she said that the Communications Technology ministry has concluded plans to put the harmonized national policy on Information and Communication Technology (ICT) on its website for public consultation, saying that Nigeria is underserved as far as broadband is concerned.

She also said that the document as harmonized would be on the ministry’s web from January 9, 2011.

“We have concluded the harmonisation of the national ICT policy and we will put the policy on our website on the 9th of January at www.commtech.gov.ng for public consultation and input,” she said.

Mrs. Johnson, therefore, encouraged stakeholders to go to the website on that d-day, look at the policy and ensures it’s in line with what customers envisaged even as he hope they would use the cost of industry going forward and make comments.

The ICT policy, mini, she said, would be the overarching guide of what is to be do in the industry.

“I really believe that with the new policy we will be well on the way to making  the ICT industry what it should be in a country as large and as diverse and as important as Nigeria,” she said.

As said by her, there are many challenges that are ahead of the Ministry and knew that the one that most people are most conversant with both within and without the ICT industry is the cost of quality of service of telecoms business.

She decried the state of poor quality of service, saying “I will say it is bad, we all know that it is bad and the operators know that it is bad.”

Her ministry, Johnson said is working with the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) to ensure that this issue is no longer a problem.

She maintained that there are many issues the operators were facing and that the number of base stations and infrastructure that are available; but her ministry is working hard to ensure that QoS is an issue of the past.

The NCC, she observed, has published quality of service indicators and they are enforcing same vigorously and holding the operators responsible for QoS indicators.

“I have met with a number of those operators and I can assure you that they are doing all that they can and we will continue to put them under pressure to ensure that they give out the quality of service that we deserve for the kind of prices that we pay.

The second priority, Johnson pointed out that the penetration of broadband in the country is dismal, insisting that Broadband is really about getting fast internet all over Nigeria in both urban, semi urban and rural areas.

“We have decided within the Ministry that this country is really underserved when it comes to broadband,” she declared, stressing that there is no body that is properly served in this country as far as internet is concerned.

Remmy Nweke

ITREALMS Online ... delivering news for ICT4D Short URLs: goo.gl, mcaf.ee, cli.gs