Nigeria’s Endless Search For Broadband

*President Goodluck Jonathan

With the berthing of three international links in Nigeria, broadband users expect nothing short of quality, affordable and seamless access to broadband Internet services. But the reverse seems to be the case as claims by Internet Service Providers in the country of offering affordable and genuine broadband services to consumers are everything but true.

ROMMY IMAH in the following reports looks at the need for seamless broadband infrastructure in Nigeria and why broadband providers abound yet, the service seems elusive as well as the panacea to guaranteeing uninterrupted availability.......

 

*Fibre Optic cable.....broadband enabler

Where Is The Broadband?

If there is any topical issue that has consistently engaged the information and communications technology industry in Nigeria, it is broadband – how to ensure the availability of broadband service in the country. Ever since the Nigerian Communications Commission under erstwhile Executive Vice Chairman, Ernest Ndukwe declared 2008 as the ‘Year of the Broadband,’ several fora organised by both the public and private sectors, have all focused on how to make broadband available and accessible to Nigerians.

The case of broadband in Nigeria has become that of the proverbial water which appears to be everywhere yet, there seems to be no water to drink. Close followers of developments in the country’s ICT sector had heaved sighs of relief following the historic landing of three major submarine cables in Nigeria namely, Main One, Glo 1 and WACS, driven by telecommunications giant, MTN. They all join the existing SAT-3. However, even with the successful landing of all of these, broadband users are still lamenting the elusiveness of this economic driver.

Experts had argued that the submarine cables combined, are sufficient enough to provide highly improved service availability and penetration in the country, and significantly reduce consumer and end user subscription prices yet, they have not been able to impact on the end user or the consumer market.

Broadband according to Wikipedia is a “telecommunications signal or device of greater bandwidth, in some sense, than another standard or usual signal or device; the broader the band, the greater the capacity for traffic.”

Expectations were high that with the avalanche of undersea cables landing on the shores of Nigeria, access to broadband services would have become a thing enjoyed by every Nigerian irrespective of where the person resides. Cost of bandwidth too would have drastically dropped. But all these seem to be mere wishes that have refused to translate into reality.

Engineer Gbenga Adebayo is the chairman, Association of Licensed Telecommunications Operators of Nigeria, ALTON. He believes that the country can only begin to enjoy these recent developments following the landings of the submarine cables when proper investment opportunities are created.

According to him, “broadband services are anchored on availability of bandwidth and with excess capacity of it at Nigeria’s shore, investment is needed to be encouraged to distribute this capacity to various geographical areas of the country for broadband revolution to be experienced as is the case with voice service.”

For a country desirous of becoming one of the 20 leading economies of the world in less than 10 years from now, the availability and seamless access to broadband cannot be overemphasized. And good enough, government seems to have underscored the importance

of this in the overall economic development of the country explaining why at the West African ICT Congress (WAFICT) held in Lagos late last year, the minister of Communications Technology, Omobola Johnson expressed the Federal Government’s readiness to collaborate with the private sector in bringing broadband to the last man in Nigeria.

Broadband has often been described as having the potential to transform the way we live, learn, work and play. And this is why countries all over the world especially the technologically advanced are investing heavily on the provision of broadband access for their citizens. The belief is that the widespread adoption of broadband would increase the efficiency and productivity of the citizenry at home and work-place.

Broadband has the potential to spur new applications, making the Internet a more significant and powerful part of the lives of Nigerians at home, work and play, and creating unlimited new business opportunities.  Indeed, broadband has the power to transform education, e-commerce, health, communications, entertainment and government.

A 2010 US National Broadband policy document describes broadband as “the great infrastructure challenge of the early 21st century. Like electricity a century ago, broadband is a foundation for economic growth, job creation, global competitiveness and a better way of life. It is enabling entire new industries and unlocking vast new possibilities for existing ones. It is changing how we educate children, deliver health care, manage energy, ensure public safety, engage government, and access, organize and disseminate knowledge.”

In a country currently battling with serious security challenges, broadband access will go a long way to checking the escalation of the security crisis. In this case, it can provide a more effective homeland security system through real-time interagency coordination, monitoring and mobilization.  In addition, a broadband infrastructure characterized by multiple carriers, multiple facilities and decentralization is resilient and reliable in the event of disruption. And when disruptions do occur, broadband supports rapid response by enabling communications and work to continue seamlessly from homes and other remote locations.

From health to agriculture and then to education, broadband access has been seen by industry stakeholders as the sine qua non for overall and speedy national development. In the area of e-learning for instance, the ability to provide rich multi-media content, online testing, and other sophisticated learning tools and to do so independent of income or location, is dependent on broadband.

E-learning can have a tremendous impact on children and individuals in remote locations or disadvantaged communities and those with physical or mental impairments that require specialized approaches to learning.

In telemedicine, broadband enables the offering of medical advice, monitoring, diagnosis and training, delivered to the remotest regions over wireless networks, sensitive to specific local needs and immediate crises and opening up a country like Nigeria to a welcome increase in the provision of basic medical services.

Early last year, Nigeria’s apex bank, the Central Bank of Nigeria announced a new cash regime for the country aimed at discouraging cash transactions and encouraging a cashless society. A successful implementation of this new economy analysts argue will depend greatly on the availability of a functional broadband technology. The non-availability of this much desired broadband is what is making Nigerians accept this new economic policy with a pinch of salt. In other words, the much hyped enthronement of a cashless society in Nigeria, may suffer some setbacks arising from non-availability of broadband access.

Perhaps, Nigeria just like many other African countries that are recently embracing this technology may see the imperative of broadband access for her citizenry, a less pressing challenge. Yet, the country is evidently too desirous of improvements in such essential areas as environmental sanitation, preventive medicine, transport, clean water and stable power supply.

As technical and confusing as technology jargons sound, so the task of ensuring the provision of voice, data and video simultaneously through high-capacity, always-on Internet access could appear neither relevant nor appropriate to authorities in Nigeria than embarking on the execution of white elephant contracts that could earn them public applause. And that is why it would be foolhardy to ignore the fact that broadband is the major enabler of social and economic change, a key driver of development from the technological top right down to an individual level, an efficient and proven force in increasing GDP per capita throughout the world.
It has been widely argued that investment in rolling out a broadband network, whether fixed or mobile, brings in itself enormous economic benefits. Telecommunications experts believe strongly that a seamless national broadband rollout enhances seamless economic development. And this direct correlation between increased broadband penetration and economic growth has been the subject of much analysis.

As cited by the ITU/UNESCO Broadband Commission’s report entitled: Broadband: A Platform for Progress, published  June 2011, the European Commission, for example, estimates an increase in GDP of at least EUR 636bn and the creation of over two million jobs in Europe by 2015.

Furthermore, a study by international management consultancy McKinsey & Company concludes that “a 10 per cent increase in broadband household penetration delivers a boost to a country’s GDP that ranges from 0.1 per cent to 1.4 per cent”.  It further reports that for much of Africa, and in developing countries as a whole, the broadband boost to GDP calculated by the World Bank is 1.38 per cent, at the very upper end of this scale.

Even as the world catches on to connectivity as a driver of economic growth, greater evidence abound to suggest that investment in broadband infrastructure at a national level is not a nice-to-have or high-tech luxury, but an economic imperative.

Nigeria with a chequered history of electricity supply can leverage on the power of broadband technology to put a stop to the country’s lingering power instability. It has been proved that broadband technology powers smart grids to control electricity supplies more accurately and even in this era of climate change, broadband enables climate monitoring to provide advance warning of natural disasters such as floods or famines.

Only recently, the Broadband Commission for Digital Development reported that broadband can help move the world towards a low carbon-economy and address the causes and effects of climate change.

Chairman of the Commission’s Working Group on Climate Change and CEO of Ericsson, Hans Vestberg noted in the report: “The understanding of the benefits that broadband can bring is at a global tipping point. Its role in GDP growth, in enabling the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), and offsetting the effects of climate change is just now starting to be understood, because finally the deployment is there and the benefits can be realized. In today’s economic climate, societies need to develop, and with a solutions-driven approach to climate change, we can accelerate a new type of green growth while supporting global sustainable development goals.”

Broadband Everywhere yet, Elusive...

Before now, the Nigerian Communications Commission, NCC had launched a number of initiatives aimed at enhancing speedy broadband access and penetration. There was the State Accelerated Broadband Initiative, SABI; the Wire Nigeria initiative, WIN. Now, there is the much hyped Open Access Model targeted at driving broadband penetration across the country.

Virtually every Nigerian Internet Service Provider boasts of offering high speed broadband service. From traditional Internet service providers to wireless service providers empowered by the universal licensing regime, everyone claims to offer the best broadband service. Yet, broadband Internet users in the country have experienced more disappointments than satisfaction from trying to have access to broadband.

Checks by this magazine show that the undersea broadband service providers are bringing enormous volume of terabytes of in-country fibre capacity into Nigeria, enough capacity to stimulate faster broadband service to all nooks and crannies of the country if well transmitted. But post-landing access in public places like cyber cafes, hotels, offices and even homes leave little or nothing to be excited about.

The truth is that in most cases where Internet services are available, they are often unreliable and are characterised by very low speeds. The cyber cafes provide the worst experience where obviously, customers are tricked into believing that they are availed to high speed broadband Internet on 3G or 4G platforms.

The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) specifies a download speed of 256 kilobytes per second or higher as constituting a broadband connection as opposed to the much slower dial-up connection to the Internet.

According to Wikipedia, most broadband services provide a continuous “always on” connection; there is no dial-in process required, and it does not “hog” phone lines. Broadband provides improved access to Internet services such as: Faster worldwide web browsing; faster downloading of documents, photographs, videos, and other large files; telephony, radio, television and videoconferencing as well as virtual private networks, remote system administration and online gaming. Experts believe that any service therefore, that does not enhance any of the afore-mentioned, is not broadband service.

Some industry experts have argued that the exorbitant cost of bandwidth has slowed down broadband penetration in the country. For instance, whereas broadband connectivity in Nigeria is as low as 0.01%, that of Tanzania, a much smaller African country is at 13%. This snail speed in connectivity is generally attributed to exorbitant cost.

It is argued in some quarters that the reason why the multitude of undersea cables currently berthing in the country have failed to improve broadband services in this part of the world is attributable to service providers’ inability to recoup what they spent in procuring bandwidth from abroad. Some of them are still utilising bandwidths they got from abroad before the undersea cables landed. Even though bandwidth is said to be available, the cost for end users is quite exorbitant.

Presently, the little success Nigeria has recorded in broadband development is through the wireless. SAT-3, Main One, Glo 1, and WASC have all landed but the greatest challenge faced by the promoters of these cables is the absence of a national fibre optic network required to carry these cables from the international link to the last mile.

Even though some efforts have been made by some telecom operators in this regard, their efforts seem not to be enough to push the required broadband penetration in the country. Unfortunately, NITEL, the country’s flagship telecom operator failed woefully in providing the fibre optic backbone needed to drive this technology in the country.

There are arguments in some quarters that part of the reason why there seems to be broadband everywhere yet, majority of Nigerians do not have access to broadband stems from government’s lack of political will to identify ICT and especially, broadband as national economic driver and chart a sustainable broadband development roadmap.

In the key indicative parametres listed for development towards the actualization of the Vision 20:2020 project, for instance, government was silent in the area of ICT. This has therefore, raised concerns among stakeholders in the ICT sector about government‘s genuine intention or otherwise in actualizing the dream of becoming one of the 20 leading economies in the world by 2020.

Government had listed areas like policy formulation, macro economy, infrastructure, education, health, agriculture and manufacturing as important indicators for focus and development. The conspicuous omission of ICT in the list has continued to confound Nigerian ICT experts.

Experts reckon that for the country to become a member of this club of the biggest industrialized nations of the world, greater investment has to be made in the development of the country’s Information and Communications Technology infrastructure. Their argument is hinged on the fact that the new economy, the Knowledge economy, which is gradually spreading across nations of the world, is driven by the instruments of ICT.

The World Bank believes Nigeria’s quest to becoming a member of the global 20 leading economies in 2020 can only become a reality if a solid ICT platform is built especially putting into consideration that Nigeria has already become a regional powerhouse in all areas driven by ICT.

Becoming a member of the 20 leading economies of the world in 8 years from now might sound ambitious but this is achievable in an economy that understands what currently drives national development globally. With continued emphasis on wastage of public fund, blatant ignorance of human capacity building in line with modern economy as well as inability of authorities to identify the importance of IT in national development, this might as well become wishful thinking.

IT experts argue that for the country to compete favourably with other leading economies of the world come 2020, the overall role of information technology in the actualization of this task cannot be swept under the carpet. They argue that time has come for government to allow for greater public participation in governance through the deployment of IT tools and applications. IT is widely accepted all over the world as an optimal tool for improving social, educational and commercial performances.

Engineer Ernest Ndukwe, former Executive Vice Chairman of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) once noted thus: “There is no doubt that without ICTs, a nation or person cannot reach her full potential in today’s global economy. No modern economy can be sustained today without an adequate and pervasive ICT infrastructure. The impact of ICT in development covers various aspects of a nation’s socio-economic life.”

Ndukwe insisted that ICT is driving the new global economy where people, businesses and communities with ready access to information technologies are better equipped to participate actively in the global economy. He added that international investors demand efficient and reliable access to ICTs especially broadband as basis for investing in any country.

Newly elected president of the Association of Telecommunication Companies of Nigeria, ATCON, Engineer Lanre Ajayi told this magazine last year, “Maybe, government has a different strategy of attaining its goal; maybe they are looking in the direction of other sectors like agriculture. Countries that have very vibrant economies today have relied hugely on ICT to get to where they are. I thought we should have taken a clue from them to use ICT as a platform to jumpstart the economy. At the private sector, we all agree that ICT has the potentials of speedily driving the economy and knocking it to shape.”

The Way to go

It was worrisome to hear the Executive Vice Chairman of the NCC say recently at a forum in Lagos that development in the wireless network arena would be slow until radio frequencies currently used by broadcasting and CDMA were freed up. Nigeria currently relies on wireless infrastructure to drive broadband penetration in the country.

But at the recently concluded West Africa ICT Congress, WAFICT, the ATCON president reiterated the need for Nigeria to set a broadband development goal if she ever wishes to achieve seamless broadband penetration and access. He added that there was need for the country to define her policy objectives and strategies in the areas of e-Government, e-Commerce, IT park development, Internet Governance, Cyber security, Internet Exchange, Spectrum management and Outsourcing, among others.

Ajayi who proposed a broadband penetration target of 50 per cent for the country within a 5-year timeframe, promised that should such a target be actualized, over 70 per cent of Nigerian homes would have been connected to broadband Internet within the same timeframe. Government he said must ensure that every Nigerian school, from primary to tertiary level as well as government offices enjoy broadband connectivity.

He called on government to provide special incentives for operators to encourage them to deepen their investment in broadband network rollout, and that such incentives should include: tax holiday as was done for the GSM rollout, lower cost of frequency spectrum, accelerated approval of request for right of ways, as well as provision of frequency licence exempt for deployment to underserved and unserved locations.

The ATCON chief who highlighted the need for a massive rollout of computers across Nigerian schools as computers are enablers of broadband penetration also proposed computer penetration of 20 percent in addition to suggesting the introduction of Computer for all Nigerian Students initiative to bring this to reality.

According to him, “Computer, in this case, means all devices that are able to access the Internet which include laptops, netbooks, tablets, eBook readers among others. When the computers, owned by students are shared with parents and other family members at home, it will enable the achievement of the proposed 50 percent broadband penetration.”

Director General of the National Information Technology Development Agency, NITDA, Professor Cleopas Angaye had at a forum recently in Lagos observed that broadband is already providing opportunities for businesses to grow on the Internet at reduced costs while at the same time, increases business success and tax revenues to the government.

“Broadband is the driver of the major benefits of connectivity but the trend of its penetration in Africa is not only very low but also reflecting a widening gap between the average African country and the more advanced countries in terms of ICT.

“A veritable means of improving access to ICT and associated tools such as the Internet is the development and deployment of broadband technologies. Through broadband, wide frequencies are available to transmit multiple and huge information concurrently within a given amount of time,” Angaye noted.

He therefore, suggested the building of a clear-cut broadband development policy that could create the enabling environment and encourage private sector stakeholders to deliver the last mile broadband access to homes and corporate organisations in the country.

Whereas IT experts in Nigeria are of the view that high cost of computers is a barrier to broadband adoption by mass market, there are calls that price of access has to be lowered without a deterioration in end user experience as well as encouragement of local content availability to increase utility.

In the meantime, Nigeria’s communications regulator, the NCC said it has already mapped out strategies to boost broadband penetration in the country including the adoption of the ‘Open Access Model,’ an initiative that provides a framework for sophisticated infrastructure sharing.

“This structure will ensure vibrancy in the market and prevent dominance as no company will be allowed to play in more than two of the service layers and the equity participation in bidding consortiums for the licenses will be controlled,” said Executive Vice Chairman of the NCC, Dr. Eugene Juwah at a recent event in Lagos.

Juwah who stated that his commission would issue licenses in the passive and active layers while price caps would be implemented in these layers using cost based pricing also added that multiple licenses would be issued in the retail layer with end user pricing determined by market forces.

“To enable service delivery at affordable prices for the end-user, where it may not be economically viable to do so, the Commission will offer financial incentives to the infrastructure providers to enable them operate reasonably profitable. In addition, the Government through the Commission will facilitate agreements and engage in dispute resolution among the various stakeholders,” the EVC added.

He declared that the NCC had already concluded preliminary studies that would enable cost effective deployment of broadband and have in addition, engaged reputable internationally acclaimed consultants to drive strategy and design the process for achieving the commission’s goals.

Yet, for other industry stakeholders, for the country to record the required broadband penetration, the required spectrum, right of way in addition to the required base stations should be provided.

Even as the country’s broadband penetration is mobile-driven, there is need to connect every nook and cranny of the country with fibre optic infrastructure. This industry experts believe, would ensure the deployment of broadband to the last mile.

Already, certain strategic agenda have been drawn for government to achieve the broadband objectives as follows: Provide periodic review of the broadband penetration targets in order to determine further action for broadband expansion; Promote both supply- and demand-side policies that create incentives for broadband backbone and access network deployment; Facilitate broadband development and deployment, leveraging on existing universal service frameworks.

They also include providing special incentives to operators to encourage them to increase their investment in broadband rollout; and to promote e-Government and other e-services that would foster broadband usages.

This may indeed be the way to go.