Says 5G will revolutionize the fourth industrial revolution….
By CALLISTUS OFFOR, Abuja –
The Minister of Communication and Digital Economy, Professor Isa Pantami on Thursday said the introduction of the National Policy on 5G networks would revolutionize the fourth industrial revolution in the country and the entire globe.
Prof. Pantami made this known on Thursday in Abuja while delivering a key note address during the Public Workshop on National Policy on 5G networks and the official handover of spectrum allocation to The Nigeria Communication Commission (NCC) for deployment.
According to the Minister, “5G networks offer major advantages over technologies like 2G, 3G and 4G that preceded it. These advantages include much lower latency, higher bandwidth, greater device density, longer battery life for nodes and greater network flexibility”.
“Today if you want to address things like insecurity, you’ll need things like robotics, artificial intelligence, data analytics. All these emerging technologies cannot be deployed effectively without 5G because 5G gives you real-time communication. With this, all these gadgets can be deployed and utilised effectively to handle security challenges”.
“Just recently, a surgery of Parkinson was conducted between a surgeon and a patient. It was a distance of over 3000km and it was successful due to the deployment of 5G networks”, he said.
These efficiencies, according to the minister are exactly what 5G promises, not just to industries, but also to individual consumers, and virtually every economic sector one could possibly envision.
The Minister, who lamented over the conservative nature of some Nigerians into accepting new innovations, however, called on the NCC to create more awareness on the benefits of 5G network.
Speaking on the handover of spectrum allocation for 5G deployment, Prof. Pantami, who doubles as the Chairman, National Frequency Management Council (NFMC), said the council acts as the custodian of all spectrum in Nigeria.
“The council collects all spectrum from telecommunications union in bulk and formally hands over this spectrum to statutory organizations namely the Nigeria Communication Commission and Nigeria Broadcasting Commission”.
“While the ministry, which serves as the secretariat of NFMC has the mandate to handle non-commercial spectrum, the NCC and NBC have the mandates of handling commercial spectrum”.
The Minister noted that the ministry has so far assigned a total of 148 non commercial spectrum, while the NCC has been mandate to use its regulatory power to assign the commercial spectrum to the winners of the auction conducted recently.
“The Mobile Telephone Network (MTN) and MAFAB Communications Limited have both been awarded the slots for the 3.5 gigahertz (Ghz) Fifth Generation (5G) Technology spectrum as they emerged winners of the auction by the Nigerian Communication Commission (NCC)”, he said.
He however, called on all stakeholders to ensure the successful implementation of the National Policy of 5G for Nigeria’s Digital Economy.
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