I agree, unless Europe bribes everyone...
Mobile Cellular Induction? (Commentary)
Source: Africa News Service
Publication date: 2000-12-09
Lagos - Nigeria is really a country of shifting contradictions. Entrust any Nigerian with public responsibility and just a matter of time he gets obsessed with intemperate appropriation of official privileges for personal enrichment. In a nutshell, the National Communication Commission (NCC) seems to be saying, "if they can't take it the way we desire it, let's make life difficult for them".
Articulating a functional cellular framework for the country remains a sour mark, just as divesting our personal interest in the telecommunications administration remains very difficult. Nobody wants to come in without going out with something, even at the risk of abusing the process. From the search for a national growth- engineered telecommunications policy to the debate for a cellular service in Nigeria, not a chance of hope seems near for the country except for the drivers and the owners of the cellular train But this is not a trip that holds for the passengers. The journey appears set for a fatal accident somewhere along the line. There is nothing to suggest that some desperate hijackers may not ambush the train along the way, at any cost.
This is simply no plan for any mobile auction. It is at best a mobile induction for friends, for money bags, for European interests, with an intention to mortgage our national aspiration. Something is definitely wrong somewhere. It is hard to conjecture how the national telecommunications policy could have provided for technological neutrality in the deployment of cellular service, but the Nigeria Communications Commission is going ahead to advertise frequencies 900 NfHz and 1800 MHz, two traditional bands for GSM. This act by implication negates the NTP clause on plurality of systems so long as they are of ITU standard and compatible with technologies. This action of NCC thus forecloses the ambition of non-GSM systems. It is therefore erroneous to say that all interests so far are overwhelming in favour of GSM when the entire process has been skewed to edge out non-GSM operators. Where is that done anyway except in traditional conservative economies of Europe? We may need to refresh our memories here. The Zambian Government was blackmailed by the South African Development Council, SADC to dump CDMA 800 MHz system from Motorola Inc. of the United States for GSM in 1998. It was a detour that left the Zambian Government with the choice of going ahead with CDMA and lose economic support from the European Council on economic development, or go GSM and continue to be part of the SADC economic integration. As the Telecel international business development director, Michael Tsumbu admitted later, "it was purely a political decision". A bit of political stick here and a doze of economic carrot there.
How did NCC come to beat a retreat from the provision of the NTP that spells out a basket of systems and for which international experts had counselled as best route for accelerated telecommunications advancement in Africa, in favour of a single cellular service which may impair our national capacity to develop? This is painfully coming after the Istanbul IMT 2000 Declaration that recommends plurality of competing technologies within the framework of approved ITU standards. So, where is the fair play? Where is the transparency? Where is the national interest in an exercise that leaves no window of opportunity for any of the existing national wireless operators whose cellular service roll out can be better guaranteed than intended prospective bidders? Couldn't the peculiar socio-economic Nigerian standard have been taken into consideration that categorizes the country into priority and less priority zones with well spelt out incentives necessary to attract investors to the less economically endowed geopolitical spheres in the country. The current guideline will only amplify the competition for Lagos, Port Harcourt, Kano, Kaduna markets and perhaps a few other commercial towns, albeit unconsciously leaving the less endowed zones without any attraction to investors.
What can be derived from this is that there was no need for undue recognition for national cellular licenses, but rather put in place a licensing process that would have made room for regional cellular operators as in India with over 30 regional GSM 900 networks. In most cases, one company operates two GSM networks, usually as joint ventures, eg Calcutta/Spice Cell and Calcutta/Usha Martin, or in Japan where DDI Cellular runs CDMA-800, PDC-800 and TACS simultaneously, IDO, another cellular giant operates a CDMA 800, NTACS and PDC 800 systems. J-Phone operates on PDCl500, Do Como on PDC 8/15 and Tu-Ka Cellular on PDC 1500.
What are we telling the world? Are we saying that spectrums are more scarce in Nigeria than it is in lndia, or we are saying that treading the route of fraud makes more sense as a reason for a non- refundable deposit requirement for an exercise that is riddled with ambiguities and questionable intentions? Yet, answers must be provided to these misgivings. Like in every other thing in Nigeria, our problem is how to manage our resources for the good of the people. The national frequency management board should be set up now with the immediate mandate of publicly advertising all available frequencies. Let the operator decide what frequency best suits the business he wants to offer. Some frequencies might be very scarce or expensive, especially the high bandwidth 1900 MHz for data, video and voice services, but there is no big deal about 900 MHz frequency that India, a third world country like Nigeria has about 34 cellular frequencies for both regional and national cellular operations.
It is this emotional craze for roaming that has unnecessarily heated up the national cellular telecommunications market, occasioned by the inability of our regulatory bosses to draw a line between their inordinate desires and the responsibility of service operators obligations to its customers. In another breadth, the crises is an offshoot of "we know it all" hidden mischief of some international briefcase-carrying consultants, brainwashing and hoodwinking our leaders into taking regrettable decisions. Opting to auction only GSM 900 license is one of those avoidable flops which the NCC is foisting on the country just to be seen to be relevant. A 900 MHz cellular license is as old as mobile telephony that has today become the pan European standard that was purely designed for voice. It is as saying that you want to auction a CDMA 800 MHz frequency for a WLL system which at the same time you can adapt for cellular mobile application without recourse for new infrastructure. It was as a result of the capacity limitation of the 900 MHz that the Europeans edged up to the 1800 MHz to cater for voice and data.
Even at that the 1800 can not support full data and video without a GPRS added package. The question then is, why dissipate unnecessary energy over what is meant for yesterday when the world is looking at the needs of tomorrow?. Why auction what can be freely distributed to more people for faster capacity build out? It is the craze for the political centre that has been the bane of Nigeria's political instability. Otherwise, why not designate some frequency bands as national and the rest as regional at a rate of one slot for national coverage and not more than two slots for regional operations.
To ensure that licenses are realistically priced, there is the urgent need to quickly address the environmental inadequacies that threaten investment in-flow to the country. Needless to repeat here that the current business and overall policy framework since liberalization of the economy is hardly investor- friendly.
An enduring and stable regulatory framework that is altered at every turn should be put in place. The rules have continually changed at a scale that has left would-be investors in deep bewilderment. Arm- twisting rules and regulations that inhibit competition are yet to be addressed and possibly removed. What is the status of NCC today? Where does NCC derive its power? Is NCC guided and protected by any existing legislation? What is the relationship between NCC and the National Assembly, the nation's law makers? To rush into any cellular auction preparatory to any commencement of service without addressing the key question of our degraded national infrastructure would be tantamount to disaster. NEPA, as we all know, is today clinically dead, or at best, bed- ridden. Energy is so strategic to successful telecommunications business, otherwise the huge investment to source alternate power supply by the private operators would be such that may burden the purchasing capacity of subscribers, rather than bring down the cost of telephone in the country. This is why Government must come up with a comprehensive package of incentives for the telecommunications sector. Look at this scenario. In the city of Johannesburg, South Africa, there are about 2,000 cell sites, which means that in a place like Lagos, a given PTO would require 4,000 generators at an average of two generators per cell site to power its base stations.
Apart from the cost of fueling the generators, there is the environmental threat from pollution with 4,000 powerful generators pumping dangerous carbons into the already polluted Lagos airspace. It would be disastrous.
With NITEL's transmission backbone already depleted, it would be a miracle for MTEL to effectively run its own cellular service not to talk of inter- connecting and carrying the traffic of PTO's. Even with plans to open up the transmission links, it would still take a while before anything meaningful can be done. So, what happens in the interim? Pay your auction fee and then embark on waiting game? Perhaps, the temptation for cheap auction funds has beclouded NCC from the critical technical pre- qualification requirements from bidders. Why is NCC not interested in the technical details of bidders to ascertain the technical capability of applicants? Why is NCC overlooking the all-important question of the business plan of applicants, at least if only to ascertain the network roll-out plan of the company, the marketing plan, cost of service per line etc. Couldn't there have been alternate ways of pricing the cost of licenses without the so called made in London ascendancy bidding that has no bearing with our current economic realities? For instance, a bid for 50 million dollars that brings in an investment of 500 million dollars within 36 months is better and more flexible than a 100 million dollar bid that brings in 250 million investment Apart from price mechanism, technical and operating capabilities, size of investment, business plan showing price shifts over a period of time are sine qua non for any sound investment plan.
The truth of the matter is that our national economy which some experts have aptly described as under intensive care unit can not support any protracted auction sale, no matter how "inverted" the auctioneers want to invent the induction. Assuming the auction produces the three winners from one geo- political zone of the country, what happens? Or, assuming two of the three winners come from one area, in a country that is so passionate about cries of marginalization. The mere fact, even though hard to defend, that NITEL/M-Tel have been discharged or shielded from an induction that both local and international investors are staking their hard earnings, mostly as loans, is quite a hard pill to swallow. The entire game plan may just backfire. That possibility gravely stares everyone in the face and blessed are those who do not hope, for they shall not be disappointed.
(Copyright 2000 This Day.)
Distributed via Africa News Online by Africa News Service.
Publication date: 2000-12-09
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