There is something that age does to a man. It doesn’t just equip him with more rags than the Millennials, the Gen-Z or the Generation Alpha, as Chinua Achebe would have loved to put it in one of the greatest books ever, Things Fall Apart; age slows down a man and tempers his views with ancient […]

Major Pay-TV service provider, MultiChoice, is in a situation that needs careful understanding and sorting without emotional recriminations. The fortunes are plummeting and that is not a good testimony for a business that was for a time a valued corporate ambassador for the nation’s business ecosystem. Fortunately, it is not all gloom. As they say, […]

There is something they say about digging yourself into a hole. It usually takes more  time to claw your way back. That is, if you ever want to see light again.  The Nigerian Communications Commission, NCC, did not intentionally dig itself into a hole. Some people, given the responsibility to curate the day-to-day operations of the […]

The news last week that the Federal Government is seemingly finalising plans to put the Digital Switchover, DSO, on an accelerator that can immediately take it to about 10 million people, was very elevating and, for me, it marks a good turn for the Tinubu administration.  The story which has been in gestation but only broke […]

The directive by the Nigerian Communications Commission, NCC, that telecom operators should pay compensation to their subscribers for prolonged network outages and also report such outages on the Commission’s Major Outage Reporting Portal, is a good one which aligns completely with the transparency garb the Commission has adorned over a time.  “By providing consumers and stakeholders […]

I had no prior information that the Kano State Government sought help from the NBC before coming up with a landmark decision on live political broadcast early in the month. But my source at the National Broadcasting Commission, NBC, said there was  indeed a stakeholders meeting on broadcasting early this year where the regulator, government and […]

The journey started in the bank and ended in the rain. Just a little transaction that demands your presence in the bank in one of those rare moments, since everything now comes at the press of a button, there was an indeterminate network downtime. So, you simply stay in the bank waiting for a miracle to […]

The late dramatist and playwright, Professor Ola Rotimi, once wrote a play, Holding Talks. In this work, which falls under the genre of theatre of the absurd, two characters are having a conversation forever or will ad nauseam be a better word. In this conversation, there is neither head nor tail and the repetition can be […]

Just when you think you have heard or seen it all in the convoluting story that is the nation’s telecommunications industry, you find out that the story hasn’t really started at all. In fact, more things begin to emerge from the cauldron of mysteries in the manner of what they call stranger than fiction.  Only last […]

The unveiling of the Artificial Intelligence Collective last week by Dr Bosun Tijani, Minister of Communications, Innovation and Digital Economy, is a good call by the Nigerian government to play a lead role in the development and deployment of AI to resolve socio-economic challenges while developing new opportunities. The Collective is a gathering of experts […]

It is certainly very refreshing to step out of your little bubble of comfort and visit some other parts of the country, especially for a good cause – the Reunion of ACCIOBA ‘79 Set, the Annunciation Catholic College Old Boys who left school in 1979. Please, don’t add 46 years ago so that you don’t make […]

Before the mid-70s, a team of young Nigerians enjoyed the privileged opportunity to be admitted into Annunciation Catholic College, ACC, Irrua, which was one of the best secondary schools in the old Bendel State, now Edo and Delta states. They came armed only with their dreams, innocence and excitement to pursue a future which looked far […]

Once upon a time, there was an Access Gap Map prepared by the Universal Service Provision Fund, USPF. The map showed details of remote sites in the country or locations in not-too-distant environments where telecommunications services were not available. The Nigerian Communications Act, NCA, 2003 recognises these areas or groups in Section 113 as unserved, underserved […]

A simmering broadcast news recently has been the story of Multichoice Nigeria jacking up subscription rates on its various packages in order to remain in business in Nigeria. Coming on the heels of other similar developments like the 50 percent hike in telecoms tariff, and the stratospheric increase in electricity tariffs last year, Nigerians were outraged, […]

The mobile industry will post nearly $11 trillion in economic value by 2030 or 8.4 percent of GDP. Last year, 2024, mobile technology and services generated 5.8 percent of global GDP, which is equivalent to $6.5 trillion of economic value. This was part of the highlights of the annual Mobile Economy Report 2025 launched by the […]