2015 is the deadline given by the International Telecommunications Union as the deadline for countries to switch over to digital broadcasting. The deadline’s nearness has given rise to real fear among stakeholders in Nigeria over the possibility of the country to meet the deadline.
Not really suprising that most stakeholders are not holding out much hope that Nigeria can transfer to digital broadcasting, as the biggest two important stakeholders in the process- the National Broadcasting Commission, NBC and the Broadcasters are also the biggest skeptics.
While the NBC maintains that a lot of funds, which it does not have at the moment, is needed to pull the switching through, the broadcasters doubt government’s sincerity about the project, since many states and federal government institutions were still ordering for analog equipment, few months to the migration date.
Well, Director General of the NBC, Mr. Emeka Mba, has a ‘healthy’ attitude towards the situation as he stated during the Digital Migration Summit in Lagos, “The heavens will not fall if Nigeria fails to meet the deadline. Yes, there are implications like signal interference, missing out on new business opportunities that may spring up due to digitization and the country not being able to compete strongly in the global digital arena, but we will still move on as a country.”
One wonders where we will be moving on to though. The world is getting digitized and Nigeria may “not being able to compete strongly in the global digital arena”.
And even though Mr Mba hinted that the NBC was planning to set up a broadcasting fund to drive content development in the sector, adding that broadcasters need to dismiss fears and support the digitization process, saying that the digitization pilot scheme which is billed to happen in Jos, June 5, 2014, will determine how far the reinvention of television in Nigeria through digital transmission will go, it’s a sad day when a broadcast leader plays down the implication of the country not meeting up with the ITU’s deadline.
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