Unleashing Prosperity through Broadband Internet

The United Nations (UN) said that the progress on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)-the set of universally accepted anti-poverty measures to be reached by 2015, has been too slow.

Around the world countries are looking for ways to rejig the initiative but the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) think that broadband internet hold the key.

According to the UN’s agency, the truly transformational power of broadband networks can help get the MDGs back on track.

That captured the very essence of high-speed internet as key driver of social and economic development.

Toeing this line, some technologically advanced nations have begun to place priority on having a high speed internet connection at home and offices for their citizens.

In these parts of the world, life cannot go on without Internet access. They recognized that without internet that there will be no small business and meaningful progress in unleashing individual creativity.

Even Finland went as far as making access to broadband every Finnish citizen's legal right and ensuring that every citizen will have access to a 1Mbps broadband connection.

Back home, some Nigerians have not seen the computer, talk less of access to internet. It is so bad that access to the internet is still considered a luxury only the rich can afford.

It is a typical case of starving in the midst of plenty because officially, Nigeria is swimming in an ocean of bandwidth with the avalanche of undersea cable systems each with landing points on the shores of the country.

But many Nigerians are still without a drop of the roaring ocean that is broadband internet because the capacity is still locked up in Lagos due to absence of last mile infrastructure.

Those that do not have broadband access wonder why so much emphasis is placed on availability, and why Internet access is so important.

When access is there, it is hardly reliable and most times too expensive thereby shutting out researchers and students from joining the global information super highway.

The result is that Nigeria still lives in the dark age of information with crude medical care, obsolete learning materials and poor understanding of the rapidly developing information system.

Thankfully, the agitation to bring forward initiatives that would make broadband internet access a right of Nigerian citizens is getting louder and from familiar quarters.

For instance, the recently released broadband investment plan for the next five years if implemented by the federal government will fire the kilns of “access, choice, openness, and innovation."

The policy was drafted by the Presidential Committee for a National Broadband Strategy and Roadmap chaired by Dr Ernest Ndukwe, former executive vice chairman, Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) and Mr. Jim Ovia, Visafone, chairman and Zenith Bank founder.

From the committee recommendations, the federal government must assist the private sector to drive pervasive access to broadband.

But private sector must also deliver not just on basic reach and penetration, but also on quality of service because it is only in doing this that all Nigerians will truly feel the positive impact and benefit of broadband.