Dr. Isa Ibrahim Pantami, minister of Communications and Digital Economy, has disclosed that there were about 16,000 reported outages by mobile network operators in the country from January 2021 to July 2021.
Dr. Isa Ibrahim Pantami, minister of Communications and Digital Economy
The outages, according to him, were due to fibre cuts, access denial and theft, leading to service disruption in the affected areas.
Pantami, who disclosed this in Maiduguri, during a recent town hall meeting, where he addressed the vandalism of power and telecommunications infrastructure, noted that the protection of the critical infrastructural facility was key to the nation’s security, economic vitality, public health and safety.
The event, organised by the Ministry of Information and Culture, was attended by Governor Babagana Zulum of Borno State; Mr. Usman Kadafur, his deputy; and other stakeholders.
Alhaji Lai Mohammed, minister of Information and Culture, led some other ministers who were panellists at the town hall meeting.
Pantami, who was represented by Mr. Ubale Maska, commissioner for Technical Services, Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), decried the situation where telecoms installations that were destroyed in the attacks by terrorists had not been replaced as a result of the lingering insecurity and tensions in parts of the North-east.
As a way forward, the minister recommended continuous stakeholders buying-in and synergy among security forces.
He also urged the National Assembly to expedite the passage of the Critical Infrastructure Protection Bill for onward submission to the President for assent.
Pantami, also said the Fifth Generation (5G) network, that was recently approved by the Federal Executive Council, would be deployed in Nigeria in January 2022.
He said when deployed, it would aid the surveillance of public assets against vandalism.
He said while the technology would boost surveillance against criminal elements vandalising public infrastructure across the country, other measures should be put in place to arrest them and bring them to book.
The minister disclosed that there were over 50,000 telecommunication sites across the country, which made it difficult to manage manually except through the deployment of modern technology.