IF Nigeria’s broadband deployment strategy must materialise, government at all levels of governance have a major role to play, the National Broadband Committee has said.

According to them, governments at various levels have critical roles to play in the drive to have pervasive broadband infrastructure across Nigeria.

The Chairman of the committee, Ernest Ndukwe said that for Nigeria to become one of the world’s leading economies, high-speed broadband networks that will provide every Nigerian with fast reliable and affordable internet access is a fundament requirement.

Speaking at the presentation of the committee’s report to President Goodluck Jonathan in Abuja, Ndukwe described the Broadband Strategy and Roadmap as a transformative tool that will revolutionize and accelerate national development.

In the report titled: “The National Broadband Plan 2013-2018”, the former Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) boss said that the broadband plan sets out a strategy and roadmap for the next five years, with focuse on the primary objective of seeing a five-fold increase in broadband penetration by the year 2017-18.

He said that the Broadband Vision for Nigeria is one of a society of connected communities with high-speed Internet and broadband access that will facilitate faster socioeconomic advancement of the nation and its people.

The Committee, which has Visafone Communications founder, Jim Ovia, as co-chairman, defined Broadband within the Nigerian Context as an internet experience where the user can access the most demanding content in real time at a minimum speed of 1.5 Mbit/s.

The committee identified the challenges common to operators in the telecoms sector as high costs of right of way resulting in high cost of leasing transmission infrastructure; long delays in the processing of permits, multiple taxations from multiple regulatory bodies, damage to existing fibre infrastructure, and the lack of reliable clean grid electricity supply.

According to Ndukwe, the key objectives of the Nigerian National Broadband plan are to promote pervasive broadband deployment, increase broadband adoption and usage, and ensure availability of broadband services at affordable prices.

The committee reiterated that the target of the plan is to have 3G/LTE Wireless Broadband coverage as a minimum to 80 per cent of the population, and fixed broadband based on fibre to at least 16 per cent of the population by 2018.

Receiving the report, President Jonathan stressed the importance of broadband to national development, saying that broadband is to the Information age, what electricity was to the Industrial Age

President Jonathan, in company of the Minister of Communication Technology, Mrs Omobola Johnson, noted that it is a fact that Broadband access and internet technologies are a key enabler of socio-economic growth and enabler of a fully knowledge-based economy. He commended members of the committee for a job well done and emphasised that the newly developed broadband strategy will help Nigeria to build a digital economy in this era of the knowledge economy. He expressed his full support of the objectives, goals and immediate implementation of the broadband strategy and roadmap for Nigeria.

In her comments, the Minister of Communication Technology re-emphasised the importance of broadband to socio-economic development. She noted that increase in broadband penetration is directly linked to increase in Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

Johnson stressed that empirical evidence shows that ten per cent penetration in ICTs leads to about 1.3 per cent increase in GDP. She stressed that the implementation of the new Broadband plan will transform Nigeria and accelerates its development to a digital economy.