NCC says inflation, right of way issues, unreliable electricity affecting 5G deployment

Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has listed the challenges facing the deployment of the fifth-generation (5G) network in the country.

Umar Danbatta, NCC executive vice-chairman who was represented by Anthony Ikemefuna, head of wireless networks, NCC, at a media capacity-building workshop organised in partnership with TheCable, stated that benefits of deployment of the 5G network are “unique latency, improved transparency in governance, increase in GDP, job creation”, among others.

Danbatta, however, said that challenges facing the network’s deployment are inflation, right of way issues and unreliable electricity.

Ikemefuna said: “1Gbps capacity from traditional microwaves cannot meet the 20Gbps demand of 5G, we need to step up into the e-Band spectrum/fiberisation of base stations.

“Some people write to us every day, begging us to establish base stations (in) their area, while some people are writing to say it should be taken away.

“Another challenge is that of inflation because you know inflation has a way of dragging cost up. When we’re talking about 5G, we’re talking about a new radio base station. So, the point is we’re going to spend a lot of money. We don’t manufacture those things here. We’ll have to import them and inflation isn’t helping matters. A dollar is about N570 now and that’s not good at all.

“And, of course, every device that will be coming into Nigeria has to be type-approved. So, you can imagine the type of work that NCC will have to go through to type-approve different types of devices that will be shipped into the country as a result of 5G.

“Also, there has to be reliable energy. Virtually every base station in Nigeria today has a generator. Our power system has to be more reliable.”