Business
By Anayo Ezugwu
STAKEHOLDERS in the telecom industry in the Nigeria have been urged to participate fully in the digital revolution of the country. Umar Danbatta, executive vice chairman, Nigeria Communications Commission, NCC, said digital revolution would give Nigeria a golden opportunity to diversify its economy.
Speaking at the 2018 Nigeria DigitalSENSE Forum in Lagos, on the topic: ‘Internet Governance: Sustaining development,’ Danbatta said internet governance would create a pro-development policy and enable the use of the internet as a development engine. The EVC, who was represented by Funmilola Akiode, director, licensing authorisation, NCC, said the forum was in celebration of the brilliance, hard work and dedication of the organisers as one of the leaders in the advancement and the use of internet.
“A lot has been achieved in African Internet development to date. To take the next steps in building a robust internet economy, many issues remain, some of which Africa shares with other developing regions and needs to be tackled.
“Some of such issues are interconnection and cross-border connectivity, economic opportunity, local content, multilingualism and human capacity building. Some also have a specifically regional dimension such as digital migration and others are global concerns such as data privacy, cyber security, IPv6 transition, and human rights and freedom of expression,” he said.
According to Danbatta, continuous internet growth in an exponential rate would bring with it new ways of transacting, communicating, learning, and socialising. Besides, he said that continuous internet growth would transform just about every aspect of human life, though the benefits of the internet are yet to be evenly distributed.
The NCC boss said that in Africa, especially Nigeria, in spite of a slow start, internet use was now rapidly accelerating (101.2m subscribers as at April 2018) and its transformative effects were increasingly accessible. “Internet remains open for development and innovation. Creative inventors of tomorrow’s Google, Skype, Facebook and Twitter are out there somewhere browsing the Internet.
“Their creativity and innovativeness should not be stifled rather should be encouraged to develop new creative ways to use the Internet. One of the main objectives of internet governance is to create a pro-development policy environment which enables further use of the internet as an engine for development.”
Danbatta listed some of the initiatives the commission was working on to provide an enabling environment for Internet Governance in telecommunications to include IPv6 Adoption and Transition plan. He said another initiative was the Internet Code of Practice that sought to promote the safe, secure and responsible use of Internet services with due regard to provisions in existing legal instruments.
“Development of clearer licensing requirements of current and new licenses to include integrated local content initiatives. More interaction with industry players on local content policy formation projects and programmes. We will sustain the dialogue to ensure active participation with all stakeholders.
“Promotion of capacity building in academic institutions to prepare students for core functions in the industry. More access to data and statistics for the academia and SMEs for research, development and innovations in local content programmes and projects,’’ he listed as NCC initiatives.
On her part, Nkem Nweke, executive director, operations, DigitalSENSE, said there was a need to focus attention on the role of internet governance in driving sustainable development in the country. She said continuous enlightenment and capacity enhancement for diverse range of stakeholders, especially women and youths, were key to meeting the needs of a critical segment of the population.
“This forum is our organisation’s way of contributing to empowering an important segment of the population, the students, youths and women in achieving their dreams,’’ she said.
– Jun 6, 2018 @ 18:55 GMT |
Tags: Internet governance will create robust internet based economy for Nigeria – Danbatta
