The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), has revealed plans to unveil guidelines and regulations on local manufacturing of telecom equipment and other services.
According to the NCC, the guidelines and regulations are line with the implementation of the Federal Government’s local content policy for the telecom industry.
Speaking at the maiden edition of Policy Implementation Assisted Forum (PIAFo) on the National Policy for Promotion of Indigenous Content in the Nigerian Telecommunications Sector, the Executive Vice Chairman of the NCC, Prof. Umar Danbatta, said the implementation of the policy led to the establishment of the Nigeria Office for Developing the Indigenous Telecoms Sector (NODITS) as a department in NCC.
The event which was held virtually, was organised by Business Metrics.
Danbatta who was represented by the Team Leader, NODITS, Engineer Babagana Digima said;
“With the constitution of the NODITS, the industry should expect new Guidelines and Regulations bothering on indigenous content, local manufacturing of telecom equipment, outsourcing of services, construction and lease of telecoms ducts, succession planning in the telecoms sector, corporate governance, corporate social responsibility, etc. as the need arises.
“Efforts being made by the Research & Development and Licensing Departments are worthy of mention in that regard. Under the auspices of the Research & Development Department, the Commission has sponsored research efforts in several universities across the country.
“Notable areas of research conducted include Development of All Weather Solar Systems For Energy Optimization in a Mobile Communications Base Stations (at Ekiti State University of Technology); Design and Fabrication of Meta-material Inspired UWB/MIMO Antenna for the 5G-Sub 6GHz Application (at Taraba State University); and “Intelligent Autonomous Multi-UAVs (Multiple Drones) Swarm Monitoring for Effective Surveillance and Situation Awareness in the Nigerian Telecommunications Industry (at Gombe State University)”.
The EVC also noted that by these activities the Commission was seeking to identify with and harness local resources in Nigerian institutions of learning for the benefit of the industry.
Earlier in his address, the Chairman Organising Committee for PIAFo, Mr. Omobayo Azeez, said the forum was designed by the Business Metrics Nigeria Team to take the promises of the indigenous content policy in the telecoms sector beyond verbal commitment.
“We believe we can only achieve objectives of the policy by creating active dialogue around it to ensure that individual stakeholders understand how they fit into the bigger picture and what role is expected of them to attain these objectives for the greater good of our economy.
“Our desire is to change this order of poetic policy pronouncement and prosaic execution by creating a midpoint interface between the government and private sector players, where policies can be dissected, digested and driven to effective implementation, and later appraised using measurable metrics to assess their success over time” Azeez noted.
