IfG.CC -
Institute for eGovernment

The other countries are Saudi Arabia, India, Singapore, South Africa and Azerbaijan.

This was the outcome of a meeting between Nigerian information and communications minister, Prof. Dora Akunyili, and mr Asraf Dulu, mauritius' minister of information and communications technology.

Nigeria is making significant strides in geospatial technology, a crucial tool for building smart cities and modern infrastructure across the country.

The Surveyor-General of the Federation, Abdulganiyu Adebomehin, said this at a one-day workshop on Thursday on the use cases for the very high-resolution drone imagery and street view data collected for part of the Abuja Municipal Area Council.

The road ahead will be long. Demand for data, internet and networking services is growing rapidly, but Nigeria's ranking in the 2013 Network Readiness Index (NRI), published by the World Economic Forum (WEF) in late July, fell by one spot in 2012, to 113th out of 144 countries. While the country showed a small improvement in its overall NRI score, achieving 3.3 points out of a total possible of seven, compared to 3.2 points the prior year, Nigeria placed behind a number of African countries, including Cape Verde (81st), Ghana (95th), Liberia (97th) and Gambia (98th).

The Director General, National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA ), Kashifu Inuwa Abdullahi believes that Nigeria has found a place on the global map of digitally competitive nations following President Muhammadu Buhari’s re-designation of Ministry of Communications into the Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy.

Speaking during a virtual webinar panel discussions where he delved on the topic; ‘The Social and Economic Impact of COVID-19 on Nigerian Youth’, he stated that with the recent government initiative to making Nigeria a leading digital economy, NITDA had refocused its effort in the implementation of the National Digital Economy Strategy.

Digitisation has become the fad in the information communication technology (ICT) age. From health, agriculture, learning and governance, fetters have been broken through digitisation. The National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) is central to achieving this goal in Nigeria. Its Acting Director-General, Dr Vincent Olatunji, highlights the challenges, reports Blessing Olaifa.

Turning ICT into cash cow

When the Minister of Communications Technology, Mr Adebayo Shittu, came, he promised to make ICT a credible alternative to oil; and he started that by inviting people to Ibadan to discuss and propose a road map for the ICT sector and how to develop the road map. He titled it “continue innovation innovative continuity” towards a SMART Nigeria and we have been working closely with the ministry because in most of the work he will be doing to move this sector forward, NITDA has a very big role to play, especially on local content. We really want to go deep into the sector and make our contribution.

The government will execute the eLocal Government Administration (eLGA) project in phases in collaboration with National eGovernment Strategies (NeGSt), a public-private partnership.

Making this known in a statement, the NCS president stated that the society was ready to partner with the government for an inclusive, prosperous and digitally enable nation.

According to various media reports, the Nigeria Computer Society has urged the Federal Government to approve the National Software Policy (NSP) which is aimed at providing the country with a roadmap to being competitive in the area of software engineering.

Nigeria CommunicationsWeek reports that the president of the society, Prof. Adesola Aderounmu, said the NSP would also assist the country in extensive digital knowledge development and implementation of e-government strategies as a basis for a corruption-free, equitable, and productive and knowledge based society.

The Nigeria Computer Society (NCS) pleaded with the Federal Government to approve the pending National Software Policy (NSP).

The advice is contained in a statement issued on Monday in Lagos and signed by Prof. Adesola Aderounmu, the president of the society.

In the statement, the NSP blue print is aimed at providing a strategic roadmap to make the country competitive in the area of software engineering,also to assist the country to have a digital knowledge development and implement e-government strategies as an imperative for corruption-free, equitable, productive and knowledge-based society.

The Nigeria Data Protection Commission ( NDPC) on Tuesday said it was on guard to ensure that individuals and organizations who want to deploy technology to drive a smart city project comply with data protection laws in the country.

This disclosure was made by the National Commissioner of NDPC, Dr Vincent Olatunji in Abuja at the Second Nigerian Data Expo and Conference (NDEC) organized by ioSafe Nigeria, and Havel Corporate Concept in collaboration with some Federal government Ministries Departments and Agencies.

Digital services in governance are no doubt very critical in delivering efficient and robust services to citizens.

With the implementation of seamless e-government system, time will be saved, government will save cost, Ministries, Departments and Agencies of government will be more transparent and accountable.

This led to the adoption of e-government by developed nations, moving from traditional governance to electronic governance over the years.

Prof. Oladapo Afolabi said the number of pensioners dropped from 97,000 to 60,000, meaning that there had been ghost pensioners and fraud.

He said that more than US$935 million was paid every month as pensions to retired federal civil servants.

With 63 million internet users available in Nigeria, the country has been ranked number one in Africa and eight in the world in terms of internet usage.

This was disclosed by the second edition of digitalfacts – Nigeria, West & Central Africa, a publication produced by digitXplus.

The book stated that the following 15 countries have the highest number of internet users in the world: China (632 million); USA (269 m); India (198m); Japan (110m); Brazil (105m); Russia (87m); Indonesia (83m); and Germany (68m). Others are: Nigeria (63m); UK (57m); France (54m); Mexico (52m); Iran (49m); Egypt (43m) and South Korea (42m).

The e-identity initiative is expected to act as a stimulus for Nigeria’s economy in the coming years, improving transparency and galvanising growth for financial services, retail, telecoms and information technology. However, slow take-up of technology and low broadband penetration levels risk delaying the benefits of this and other e-government programmes.

The initiative is being implemented through the Science and Technology Education Post-Basic (Step-B) Project under the Federal Ministry of Education, in partnership with the Ministry of Labour and Productivity, Ministry of Communications Technology and the Outsourcing Development Initiative of Nigeria, a private sector company that trains unemployed graduates with skills and connects them with employers.

What is your take on mobile broadband penetration in Africa?

Africa has demonstrated economic growth in broadband ahead of other continents. Over the past decade, six of the world's ten fastest growing economies in broadband, according to The Economist rating of December 2011, were Africans. It was estimated that that Information and Communications Technology (ICT) spending in Africa will grow a further 4.9 per cent in 2012 to reach $48.7 billion by the end of the year.

“Internet Exchange Points (IXP) are critical to improving internet access and lowering connectivity costs in the continent," the report states.

Nigeria has the third most developed Internet ecosystem in Africa, a new report has shown.

The report by Internet society, a global nonprofit organisation promoting the development and use of the Internet, said Nigeria ranks just below South Africa and Kenya.

Nigeria has achieved 40.18 percent Broadband penetration, the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Dr. Isa Alli Ibrahim Pantami has said.

The Minister revealed this on Thursday, while inaugurating Broadband Implementation Steering Committee (BISC) to accelerate the attainment of 70 percent broadband penetration target by 2025 in Abuja. Pantami, who expressed satisfaction with the contribution of the sector to the nation’s GDP, described the contribution as unprecedented.

The country’s ministry of information and communication technology hopes that increased government effort will help enhance the service quality and delivery of the sector, especially over worries of poor service has surfaced.

“Nigeria is always in a tough position because we have some great ideas and companies, but too often this gets bogged down by poor service and corruption,” said Thomas Eto, a Lagos-based IT expert.