The fourth Stakeholders Forum organized by the Nigerian Communications Commission and managed by IT & Telecom Digest will now hold on May 26, 2009, at the Golden Gate Restaurant, Ikoyi, Lagos. Focusing on a broad spectrum of issues pertinent to operators and consumers, the one-day workshop has been designed to serve as a platform for fine-tuning projections as well as focusing on future trends in the ever dynamic Nigerian telecom industry.
The Stakeholders’ Forum, initiated by Africa’s foremost ICT magazine, IT & Telecom Digest, will bring together under one roof, operators, equipment manufacturers, government officials, consumers and other interested parties, essentially to find ways to better protect the consumer in the emerging convergence in the industry.
Key industry players, companies and individuals in the support industry like power, software, equipment suppliers, as well as the academia and consumer advocacy groups, among others, have already confirmed attendance in an event to be led by Engr. Ernest Ndukwe, the executive vice chairman of the NCC.
Coming at a time when the industry is under pressure from the global economic meltdown, this year’s edition of the Stakeholders’ Forum will be used keenly by the Consumer Affairs Bureau of the NCC as a medium of reaching out to operators and the various businesses that have developed around the increasingly successful ICT industry in Nigeria. This is with a view to getting them all serve the consumers best in an atmosphere free of rancour in the emerging global village being further brought about by convergence in the ICT industry.
While most operators around the world are contending with the biting crunch of the economic downturn, the NCC has severally assured that the Nigerian industry is insulated by the government’s continued protection of the consuming public through deliberate policies.
This people oriented government policy is part of the mandate of the regulator of the industry and in the last eight or more years, the NCC has introduced innovative consumer protection programmes which has served as an interface between them (consumers) and operators such as the Consumer Parliament.
Therefore, the idea of discussing the place of the consumer in the growing convergence of the ICT industry in Nigeria and by extension the rest of the world is appropriate and is in direct consonance with the government set objective.
Mr. Mkpe Abang, editor-in-chief and chief executive of IT & Telecom Digest magazine, described the NCC choice of subject, as most apt and timely, especially at a time like this when the world is in turmoil over the economic indices that continue to plummet. “For the Nigerian consumers, they should count themselves lucky given the kind regulator that the NCC is and indeed, the other government agencies that recognize their roles at a time like this,” he said.
Speakers at the Forum this year like in other years would be drawn from operators, equipment suppliers, alternative services providers like the power sector, computer, Internet Services Providers and some concerned consumers of these services. They are expected to deliberate and seek for ways of improving the growth that the industry has already experienced.
It would be recalled that the NCC in the last couple of years have dictated the direction of regulation among other countries of the world especially in Africa where fellow African countries have adopted most of its programmes to affect their regulatory environment.
The Stakeholders Forum is one of such programmes that the agency have used over the years to feel the pulse of the industry and enrich its own regulatory functions. This year however, the focus is not strictly limited to telecommunications as the industry with its massive expansion has influenced the other components of the general ICT industry.
