FEC Approves Merger of NCC/NBC

The Federal Executive Council (FEC) has approved the merger of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) and Nigerian Broadcasting Commission (NBC), paving way for the collapse of the two agencies into one powerful entity, Nigeria CommunicationsWeek can now report.

But it is only an approval in principle as a new Act (law) is needed to give the resultant baby from the merger legal teeth.

Wednesday’s FEC meeting which was chaired by President Goodluck Jonathan lasted into the night and brushed aside strong objections to the merger by the Ministry of Information.

Nigeria CommunicationsWeek gathered from sources at the meeting that President Jonathan is wielding his political will to position the ICT industry as economy driver and ostensibly to cut waste.

According to the source, the ministry of Communications Technology put forward profound argument for the merger which impressed the President.

“The ministry of Communications Technology pointed to digitization programme and insisted that streamlining the regulators would be a requisite to achieving the country’s target of fully migrating to digital broadcast by 2015,” said one of our sources.

Our sources noted that CT ministry argued that opening up frequencies locked away by broadcasting stations would widen telecom operators offering of voice and data services and, consequently, increase penetration, especially in the country’s rural areas.

Merging the broadcasting regulator and its telecom counterpart has been topical issue matter for debate with both sides of the divide arguing for and against with strong passion.

Ministry of Information officials, our sources stated argued against the merger in last Wednesday’s FEC meeting pointing at infrastructural challenges as well need to keep the broadcast industry under close watch to guide against abuse.

Nigeria CommunicationsWeek gathered that at a point in the FEC discussions President Jonathan reportedly asked Labaran Maku, Minister of Information, how many times broadcast stations have been shut in the past six years, to which the minister said five times.

On the score the argument, Mr. President gave his nod for the merger but said he would have to look at the procedures closely to guard against the problems the process is seeking to eliminate.

Nigeria CommunicationsWeek gathered that the new draft National ICT Policy, released in January 2012 seeks to bring together all of Nigeria’s related technology policy under a single statute.

This is by overhauling outdated regulations to better manage the country’s dramatic growth in computer and internet usage over the past decade.

Under the policy the government intends to create legal and institutional frameworks.

The draft also targets improving access, investment, research and development, and plans legislation in cyber crime, ethical and moral conduct, privacy, copyright, intellectual property rights, piracy and e-transactions.”