By Steve Agbota
The federal government, through the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), has disclosed that plans were underway to conclude the infrastructure companies (InfraCos) process soon.
The NCC’s Executive Vice Chairman, Prof. Umar Danbatta, at the weekend, shortly after an award programme organised by Tell Magazine in Lagos, where he bagged the “CEO of the Year” award, said that there were plans to pick the new five from about 60 bidding firms for the remaining regions.
Danbatta explained that, under NCC’s Open Access Model for Next Generation Optic Fibre Broadband Network, licensed InfraCos are geographically focused to provide wholesale layer-two transmission services on a non-discriminatory, open access, price-regulated basis.
“We are about to conclude the process. About 60 firms submitted bids for licenses of the remaining zones. This is a massive number and as I am talking to you we are about to conclude the selection process and, very soon, I think by July, the commission should come out with information about the successful bidders and those to be offered the InfraCo licenses consistent with the conditions of the regulatory framework of the Open Access Model that is driving the deployment of broadband infrastructure in the country.”
Speaking on MainOne and IHS, firms, which already have the licenses for Lagos and the North Central, but are yet to roll out services, the NCC head said: “We have been monitoring the progress so far made. For Lagos, we are quite happy about how far the firm has gone with laying of fibre. But for the North Central zone, the commission is not happy. Action is being taken to ensure a remedial measure is put in place in order to speed up process of deployment in that region. We shall come out to announce new development around the process soon.”
Speaking on the award, Danbatta said it was a testimony, a positive verdict to what “we are doing to Nigerians and the society from the Nigerian Communications Commission. As we have been advised oftentimes that awards are to make us work more, we should be circumspect about them.”
He maintained that quality of service has always been a challenge, saying, “There are factors that affect good quality of service. There are technical factors, which the commission can do something about and there are non-technical factors, which the commission has to engage government at the three levels in order to contain these multitude of problems that are affecting quality of service.
“The situation at the moment is that we have noticed some improvement in the quality of service, but it is still far below the stipulated standard of the key performance indicators that we have deliberately put in place in order to ensure that quality of service improves.”
Meanwhile, president of Tell Magazine, Nosa Igiebor, said the reason Danbatta was chosen as “CEO of the Year” was because the NCC represented a public institution that works.
According to him, since it was established “it is one public institution that has been professionally run and the way it is structured and the staff are very professional, that is why NCC has become a reference point for telecommunications regulation not only in Nigeria but globally.”