In its bid to promote the telecommunication ecosystem for rapid socio-economic development, the Federal Government has launched a new strategic vision plan (SVP) (2021–2025) developed by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC).
Speaking at the ceremony which also featured the unveiling of a compendium of speeches by the NCC executive vice chairman, Prof. Umar Danbatta, and the commission’s podcast channel yesterday in Abuja, the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Prof. Isa Pantami, said the document would provide an enabling environment for growth of the telecom sector.
According to him, the main function of the communications ministry is to provide an enabling environment for the private sector to thrive, stressing the necessity for the private sector to be more successful because they control majority of the economy.
He added the ICT sector was able to contribute about 17.92 per cent to GDP in the second quarter of 2021 through policies and regulations that allowed the private sector to thrive.
“Strategic vision is key to the foundation of whatever we do. Usually, strategy cascades our national policy for implementation. This strategy of NCC has cascaded the two national policies that are relevant to it, most importantly, the national digital economic policy and strategy for a digital Nigeria and Nigerian national broadband plan. This is what the strategy is all about,” he added.
Commenting on the podcast, he said the NCC was facing several challenges and lack of public perception of the faction of the commission which he said would improve with the launch of its podcast, as it would also be an avenue to provide citizens with information on how they could get security intervention.
Earlier, Danbatta said the new SVP (2021–2025), the successor to the SVP (2015-2020) took into cognizance of several notable advancements in the Nigerian telecommunications industry within the last five years.
According to him, the new SVP 2021-2025 has five items namely Organizational Renewal for Operational Efficiency and Regulatory Excellence; Facilitating the Provision of Infrastructure for a Digital Economy which fosters national development; Promoting Fair Competition, Inclusive Growth, Increased investment and Innovative Services; Improved Quality of Service (QoS) for Enhanced Consumer Quality of Experience (QoE); and Facilitating Strategic Collaboration and Partnership.
He further said the podcast ‘NCC Global Connect’, was developed to boost the image and visibility of the corporation both locally and internationally in order to attract the attention of prospective investors into the Nigerian telecommunication’s market.
He maintained the podcast would give this information to interested investors coupled with the various policies of government under the leadership of President Muhammad Buhari.
“Establishing the podcast channel is in line with our strategic initiatives to boost the corporate image and visibility of the commission via the adoption of innovative channels of communication by developing audio and video contents to reach our stakeholders within and outside the country as well as using it to attract the attention of prospective investors into the Nigerian telecommunication’s market,” he said.
The NCC boss added the compendium titled ‘Catalysing Nigeria’s Socio-Economic Transformation through Broadband Infrastructure’ tells the stories of how the commission had fared these years and the level of investments it had attracted, as well as give readers the historical background and authoritative context to the growth that is now being enjoyed by the industry.
