Posted by From Kunle Aderinokun in Abuja on
Minister for Communications, Chief Cornelius Adebayo, said at the weekend, that the National Rural Telephony Project would take off by December, with 210 out of the 774 local governments of the federation.
Minister for Communications, Chief Cornelius Adebayo, said at the weekend, that the National Rural Telephony Project would take off by December, with 210 out of the 774 local governments of the federation.
Making this known at the weekend, in Abuja, when he received 42 engineers who just came back from training in China, Adebayo said the base stations in some of these local government areas would be switched on very soon.
According to him, 'by the end of this year, the National Rural Telephony Project would take off in earnest, and any moment from now, we shall be switching on some of the base stations.
'The intention is to ignite the entire local government of the
federation through this project, starting with 210 of them."
He recalled that President Olusegun Obasanjo had in 2003, signed a Memorandum of Understanding with China for the National Rural Telephony project and since then, the project has been on the priority list of the Federal Government.
The 42 engineers, drawn from Ministry of Communications, Nigeria Communications Commission (NCC), and the Nigeria Telecommunications Limited (NITEL), were trained for three months at Alcatel Shanghai Bell University.
They were trained on switching and billing level B; switching and billing level C and; transmission and power.
In his remarks, Team Leader, Engineer Festus Daudu, recommended that a management training contract be formalised with Alcatel Shangai Bell, to sustain the technical capabilities of the trained engineers to manage the project.
He said 'a rural telecom agency be established to become the successor agency to manage the project when delivered," adding that 'all the trained officers be made to take part in full supervision, to enable them apply the knowledge acquired."
In addition, he said 'adequate funds should be made available for proper and effective project supervision, so that the project may not die like other laudable government projects of the past."