Glo, NCDF Provide 50,000 Public Phones for Rural Nigeria

*Jameel Mohammed, Globacom GCOO

Globacom has announced a partnership with Microfone Telecoms, a subsidiary of the Nigerian Capital Development Fund (NCDF) that will see 50,000 lines supplied to rural areas across Nigeria. 

The project is also expected to create thousands of jobs for Nigerians in the country side while increasing the tele-density of the nation.

The partnership details show that Microfone will establish Village Public Phone Centres to bring telephony to rural communities while Globacom will provide an initial 50,000 SIM cards with airtime riding on its Infinito platform, enabling users to make calls at  as low as 25k per second.

Globacom will in addition provide a customer service desk to cater specifically for the lines on the scheme.

Speaking at the agreement-signing ceremony at the Mike Adenuga Towers headquarters of Globacom in Lagos, the Group Chief Operating Officer of the telecoms firm, Mr. Jameel Mohamed, said the project will provide not less than 50,000 jobs for public telephone operators.
“Other ancillary jobs will also spring up through this project thereby further enriching life at the grassroots”, Jameel said.  

Executive Vice President of the NCDF, Mr. Babatunde Oralusi, confirmed that the partnership with Globacom will make greater impact on the grassroots “by accelerating the NCDF’s pro-poor empowerment programmes”.

He praised Globacom for its pro-people and pro-Nigerian orientation, assuring that the project will subsequently add more lines to the initial 50,000 in the course of the scheme.