POLITICAL ECONOMY

Local Content In ICT: Pantami Says Government Has Done Its Part

…Urges Stakeholder Experts To Wake Up

By Clifford Agugoesi, Editor-in-Chief

ICT Stakeholders  and the Minister of Communications & Digital Economy, Dr. Isa Ali Ibrahim Pantami, have disagreed over the seriousness of the Government of Nigeria on the implementation of policies that conduce with the growth and development of the ICT sector with the former insisting the government has not done enough.

Led by the Institute of Software Practitioners of Nigeria(ISPON) who was represented at a recent hybrid  ICT stakeholders’ forum held at Lagos Oriental Hotel, south west Nigeria, these experts held that a lot has been achieved by the Federal Ministry of Communications & Digital Economy(FMoCDE) with less than two years of its coming into being, under the watch of Dr. Isa Ali Ibrahim Pantami, but the software sector.  Indeed, ISPON alleged Nigeria was not consuming what it was producing.

Pantami disagreed, saying government had done its part and urged and advised the experts to rise to the challenge proactively.

He said: “I think at the federal level, our main responsibility as government is to provide the enabling environment , to come up with policies that will support the patronage of indigenous content and with all sense of modesty, this administration has done its part.  Firstly, if you could recall vividly, this administration signed an Executive Order on the Patronage of Local Content and that Executive Order was signed on the 1St of May, 2017.  And also, this administration signed another Presidential Order on February 12, 2018 re-emphasising that Executive Order and also mandating all private and public institutions to give priority to Nigerian products and citizens. 

Furthermore, only on May 6, 2021, some of our colleagues here, joined Mr. President virtually, where he launched and unveiled a National Policy on Indigenous Content in the Telecommunications sector. If you go through this Policy you will clearly see how this administration has given priority and treatise to our Indigenous Content.

Towards A Good Perception

I don’t want to say Local Content; I always avoid using the word local, because most of our citizens, because of our perception with the word local, will consider local as opposite of original, so whenever we engage with government institutions and other citizens that ‘this is local content,’  they will say ‘you say  local.’  So their perception of local is the opposite of original, so because of this, I always avoid  using the word local content, I always prefer using the word Indigenous Content, so that it has nothing to do with original or fake but rather  to show the origin that this is an indigenous one.  The Policy is in place.  Institutions that are regulatory bodies in that Policy and in the Executive Order have been directed to ensure enforcement.  In the ICT sector, we have NITDA, NCC, NIMC.  In Science & Tech we have NOTAP. These are all regulatory bodies.   Our own role at the federal level is to formulate policies and to ensure regulators concerned themselves with enforcement.  While I was in NITDA, the Department of Local Content  Policy when it comes to computers  was less than 80,000 annually but before I left it was well over 500,000 with an increase of 700 per cent . To me, the main challenge here lies on the table of our experts  that  produce  software or hardware. What are they supposed to do?

Firstly, by significantly improving the quality of what we have been producing so that it can be presentable.

Secondly, when there is any institution that fails to comply with Executive Order or Government’s Policy, you can draw the attention of the regulatory bodies to that.  If the regulatory bodies fail to act, you can then escalate it to their supervisors, their supervisors are Ministers and I can assure you, since I became a Minister till date, no single institution has formally complained to me about any regulatory body under our supervision , that fails to ensure the compliance.  You know the market better than all of us, we are more into policy, you are into the business.  So if there is any institution that fails to patronize the business and you know the quality is, at least, standard, let us know through the regulatory body.  But the problem: how can you anticipate government that has comes up with Executive Orders and Policies to be going from one office to another to carry out enforcement?”

According to Pantami, the responsibility before ICT stakeholders was a collective one and pleaded for  mutual support. “Of course, if you escalate to us, we want to give you the assurance that the right thing is going to be done, but so far, we are not aware of any complaints officially. 

Also, even during Federal Executive Council Meetings, from other Ministries, when  there are ICT projects,  I always made sure I spoke in defence of our local policy.  I always direct NITDA to ensure that priority and preference is given to local content.  This has internalized in NITDA as they know that a certain percentage must go to Local Content. As far as I am concerned, the stakeholders must wake up and escalate any lack of compliance to government so that we can ensure that our institutions comply with the federal government directives,” he said.

To buttress his point that government was proactive on the issue of Local Content, he explained that his Ministry came up with over 12 policies aimed at bolstering the growth of the ICT sector, including, but not limited to:

•             National Digital Economy Policy & Strategy For A Digital Nigeria 2020-2030. 

•             Nigeria National Broadband Plan 2020-2025

•             National Policy For Virtual Engagements In The Federal Public Institutions

•             National Policy On Digital Identity For Internally Displaced Persons In Nigeria

•             National Policy On Indigenous Content In The Telecommunications Sector

•             National Policy For NIN-SIM Registration In Nigeria

•             National Digital Innovation, Entrepreneurship & Startup Policy

The Minister explained that most of these policies were being implemented while others were in draft format awaiting okaying by the Federal Executive Council (FEC), adding these policies were online and could be freely downloaded from the websites of the Ministry and her agencies and departments.

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