Accelerated work on a Critical National Infrastructure Bill that covers issues critical to rapid broadband deployment is in progress, courtesy of the National Broadband Council. Issues central to broadband deployment which will need attention from various perspectives include damage to all infrastructure including telecoms, a spectrum audit, and a wholesale pricing audit that will lead to reduction in the cost of deploying telecommunications infrastructure. These, among others will be addressed by the Infrastructure bill, which when passed into law, will help achieve national broadband plans by 2017.

Vice President, Global Technology Policy, Cisco, Mr. Robert Pepper is advisory council member of the Alliance for Affordable Internet, A4AI at the just concluded Commonwealth Technology Organization, CTO in Abuja. He moderated a panel discussion with ministerial experts on affordable broadband. In this interview, he bares his mind on the purpose of A4AI, Cisco’s role in the project and how A4AI plans to boost broadband access and plan to crash the cost of broadband in Africa, among others.

Digital pay TV platform, GOtv, last week declared that Nigeria has been most friendly to its two years of operation in the country even as it declared year 2013, in particular, as a special one.

To further expand its operations in Nigeria, telecommunications equipment maker, ZTE is set to launch its smartphones in the Nigerian market.

Nigeria’s telecoms revolution and the over $25bn FDI it brought, among other things, last week, became strong credentials that lured African regulators to Lagos to discuss ways regulatory policies could give hope to African telecom consumers.