The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), will on Thursday at the Social Media Week Lagos (SMWL) 2020 present how the Fifth Generation (5G) networks will impact Nigeria’s socio-economic landscape and the inherent challenges to the deployment.
In a statement, signed Henry Nkemadu, Director, Public Affairs at NCC, the Commission said the presentation will form part of a special session. which will hold at 1:00 p.m. in the Main Stage on Day 4 of the 5-Day event taking place from 24-28 February 2020 at Landmark Event Centre, Victoria Island, Lagos.
The statement noted that as a regulator of the country’s fastest-growing and most dynamic sector – the ICT sector – the Nigerian Communications Commission will mount the stage to steer a conversation focused on: “Fifth Generation (5G) Networks Deployment: Socio-economic Benefits and Challenges.”
It added that the Executive Vice Chairman of NCC, Prof Umar Garba Danbatta is expected to lead the discussion at the event, which will focus on the Fifth Generation networks from different perspectives. The non-commercial first Proof of Concept (PoC) trial of Fifth Generation (5G) Networks took place in the country in November 2019.
As the Nigerian Communications Commission prepares the ground for 5G networks launch, it continues to take several steps aimed at continuously improving the quality of service (QoS) both for voice and data services.
Some of the steps include monthly engagement sessions with operators on QoS, quarterly QoS Industry working group meeting, engagement with the Nigerian Governors Forum to align right of way charges with that agreed courtesy the National Economic Council resolution; and engagement with individual governors to reduce and eliminate the incidences of site shutdown by state government agencies.
The steps also include instituting benchmarking drive test across the country to measure performance of each operator in a given area and identify coverage gaps with a view to bridging them; instituting new QoS measurement mechanisms for assessing the QoS performance of operators to ensure measured performance more closely aligns with subscriber experiences across all states of the federation; deployment of QoS measurement systems at the Commission to enable near real-time assessment of QoS across the country from the Commissions office, among others.
Therefore, the panel session at Social Media Week, Lagos (SMWLagos) is sponsored by NCC to provide more information, education and knowledge required by telecom stakeholders and citizens, and to enable participants to raise critical questions that may be agitating their minds.
The Social Media Week Lagos, where NCC has become an annual distinctive corporate participant and programming partner for five consecutive years, is Africa’s largest digital technology and innovation conference. The seventh edition of the conference, which held in 2019, was attended by over 20,000 people. The programme also had an “online social media reach of 557 million”. The event brings together thought leaders, key stakeholders and the public to explore issues that are important for the modern world.
The Social Media Week Lagos 2020 tagged: HUMAN.X, is thematised on the centrality of humanity and “experience-driven approach to innovation across industries, communities and the continent.”