Stories by Etta Michael Bisong
Abuja
The new communications industry roadmap has proposed the transition into a “SMART Digital Nigeria” as the required panacea to bridge the uneven growth presently dominating the ICT sector.
Expected to be implemented between 2016 and end 2019, the plan observed that Nigeria’s longstanding focus mostly over the last seventeen years on Information Technology infrastructure development as well as concentration on ensuring an enabling environment for competitiveness is responsible for the explosive but uneven ICT sector.
Other areas in the industry that have enjoyed tremendous attention include promotion of ICT local content, ICT deployment in Government and expansion of ICT access to Nigerians.
Barrister Abdur-Raheem Shittu, minister of Communications who unveiled the document yesterday at a world press conference held in Abuja, said the dominant issue now is how to sustain the current growth in the industry to make sure that it reaches every part of the country both urban and rural.
“The time has now come to leverage the bountiful opportunities in the Communications sector to generate additional revenue for government, now that the prices of oil have been on rapid decline at the international market, create employment for our teeming youths, improve access and enhance quality of service delivery and affordability in the country,” the minister said.
This, he added will ultimately enhance transparency and good governance in line with our CHANGE agenda on which this government rode into power.”
The nation’s Communications boss raised six critical questions that must be considered if national progress is to be made and these includes – how to build on existing growth to ensure that ICT reaches all the nooks and crannies of Nigeria, how to ensure that every Nigerian has access to ICT and how to deepen the penetration of broadband.
Others have to do with the improvement of the Quality of Service Delivery by Government, how to ensure that information and knowledge is not only secured but enhances our national security and creating of more jobs for as well as unleash the creativity of our teeming youth for overall national development.
He hinted that the roadmap is intended to create a pathway to answering the above questions, which were raised after various consultations with stakeholders who resolved that all policies and programmes must be guided by specific timelines while implementation must be measurable.
The philosophy of the new thinking Barrister Shittu explained is aptly captioned: Continuing Innovation and Innovating Continuity: Creating a SMART Digital Nigeria. “This conceptual double helix is what I sincerely believe to be the cultural DNA we need to embed to create a SMART Digital Nigeria to bring about the CHANGE we seek,” he said.
