By Emmanuel Elebeke
As Nigeria join the rest of the world to savour the various business opportunities being present by Mobile telephony, the the national resident of the Association of Telecom Operators of Nigeria, Engr. Titi Omo-Ettu has declared that only good political leadership driven by ICT that will help Nigeria realize its Vision 20 2020 dreams.
He therefore charged Nigerians to brace up for the challenge of electing only politicians who are ready and willing to leverage on the opportunity provided by ICT and and ready to work with the professionals in all their groupings to lead the country. To him, only the politicians who are ready and willing to use ICT that are better qualified and have the right to lead Nigeria, come 2011.
Omo-Ettu spoke at the annual assembly of IT Professionals organized by the Computer Professionals Registration Council of Nigeria, CPN in Abuja. In a paper entitled .
“The Business Opportunities of Mobile Servicesâ€, the ATCONPresident said the metamorphoses of technology has made us improved our living standards and sharpened our business instincts that things that were not possible a few years back are now possible, thus making the whole world responding to changes and improving in all facets of human life.
Based on this premise, he argued that Nigeria can no longer afford to hand over its destiny into the hands of leaders who are neither ICT compliant nor appreciate what they can do with ICT to transform the fortunes of the citizenry.
He wondered what the country was able to achieve in a space of less than 15 years that the internet arrived the shores of Nigeria, saying that there is no stopping of Nigerians relying their life’s on mobiles systems and the huge business that is in there. And to achieve this, he said effort should be geared towards ensuring that the un-served over 130 million Nigerians are adequately served.
“I submitted that the technology exists now waiting for the business initiatives to take over. I reminded Nigerian IT practitioners that their own aspect of the business is mainly in Content Creation which to him, is only imported. My position is that Opportunity cannot be more than this,†he posited.
Omo-Ettu added: “we in ATCON will invite Presidential Candidates of all political parties for the 2011 elections to address our members on what plans they have for ICT.â€
HE then admonished all other professional associations at all levels to also engage the politicians at various levels what they have in stock for their own professions and trades too. With that, he said Nigerians will be able to put politicians on the spot and prepare them for accountability in all aspects of their responsibility even before they transform into ‘excellencies’ and ‘honourables’.
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