Troubling stones in the noodles of technology

For most of last week Obollo Afor and Okpella were on my mind. The more I look at the soaring cost of products and services in the broadcast and telecommunications industries, the more enamoured I was on these two towns in Enugu and Edo States respectively, that could provide some really good fun on a road trip, when life used to be good and people could have some bit of fun on the road thinking of the next stop to have some welcoming native delicacy and hospitality.

Each time we headed towards Obollo Afor on any of my several trips to this beautiful gateway town in Udenu Local Government area of the state, my mind was on the bottles of groundnuts and very attractive bananas displayed by the road side. It was always very nostalgic to haggle with the natives and get the best deal but all the time just enjoying the joy and peace they seem to carry on their heads.

The same with Okpella in Edo North where they have some of the best groundnuts in the country. One nut fills your mouth, leaving a lasting taste. Before the road became messed up and bandits took ownership of whatever was left of it, Okpella was one of the most important  trading points on the road, where one could literally fill a vehicle with assorted foodstuffs – groundnuts, plantains, and even banana and snails. Giving somebody a bottle of groundnuts from Okpella in Abuja or in my town somewhere in Edo state could be more pleasing than a bottle of good wine.

The same feeling I got some years ago after having a ride round the Maiduguri metropolis one night and stopping at some point to buy apples which made my dinner that night. I looked at the joy of the locals and really never had the urge to return to Abuja but for family and the daily grind to eke a living.

Pray, where is the concourse between Obollo Afor, Okpella and Maiduguri, and telecommunications and broadcasting? I am only trying to look at the very little things of life to throw some light on price and cost movements in some other elite sectors we consider indispensable. A bottle of groundnuts is selling for N1000 in some places, so the excitement of a road trip to that part of the East and Edo State has diminished naturally, and that part of Maiduguri that was like a dreamland is no more accessible as bandits and other infernal beings have quartered the environment for their suzerainty.

The journey of a bottle of groundnuts from N350 in Okpella or Obollo Afor to N1000 has so much to say about the price increase in DSTV subscription or even the threats by telecom operators to increase rates if the cost of diesel and other ancillary costs for service delivery are not modulated to accommodate reality. What has been impossible for us to admit or properly acknowledge and then begin to seek ways to ameliorate things, is the crushing impact of a failing system that has pushed more people to rummage the garbage bins for daily survival.

Yet we would wish that things remain the same and that prices of goods and services are as fixed as the hard back of a tortoise irrespective of the fickleness of the Naira and the obtuse discombobulation in the entire ecosystem. So, instead of getting down to do their job, some lawmakers at the National Assembly would whine one day that broadcasting is a social service, why should one pay so much for DSTV when NTA, AIT, CHANNELS and TVC, among others, are free? In a deregulated sector, where investors have ploughed in a lot of investments, some guys would go to court to seek the intervention of the judiciary in putting on ice a business decision influenced by the vagaries of a market that has increasingly become a puzzle to experts and professionals.

But here is the reality that stares us in the face. DSTV is a luxury item, like a Mercedes Benz car or Lamborghini or a Louis Vuitton bag; you are under no compulsion to buy one. It is better that we clean up NTA to make it a better station rather than harassing DSTV. In effect, DSTV offers subscription services. Both Multichoice and Star Times offer pay TV channels with contents paid for upfront. Pay Per View which demands premium payment for premium contents, like Wrestlemnia 38 of last weekend, has nothing to do with Pay As You Watch which is akin to the Pay As You Go on mobile services. It is inept to equate the two and rather sinful not to consider the business model of the service providers before forcing conditions on them. A friend suggested that most Nigerians are used to entitlement mentality, getting freebies without contributing any little sweat or cash.

While our attention is focussed on what individuals should pay to enjoy esoteric taste, I will once again want to point out that the broadcast industry is facing serious challenges and that time has come for the National Assembly to work with the regulator, the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) to avoid imminent chaos of international proportions. What is happening to the Digital Switchover (DSO) process? Can the Minister who hijacked the process from the NBC give the nation an update?

I had written recently that one day Nigerians would wake up and be unable to receive some television channels or be able to make a phone call because of soaring diesel cost and the operating environment that was getting increasingly difficult . I had no inkling that the Kogi State government was working earnestly towards achieving that state of anomie until the Association of Licensed Telecommunications Operators of Nigeria (ALTON) threatened, last week, that they would shut down operations in the state if the government does not stop harassing them with obnoxious taxes.

Through the Kogi State Internal Revenue Service (KIRS), the government has been shutting down telecom facilities as they demand for taxes most of which hardly exist in any book.

“This issue is likely to lead to a total communications blackout in the entire Kogi State, parts of Abuja the Federal Capital Territory and possible impact on service availability in some parts of the following States: Nassarawa, Benue, Enugu, Anambra, Edo, Ondo, Ekiti, Kwara, Niger States. These are States sharing borders with Kogi State,” the operators have warned.

This is my little question. If the telecoms industry is so vital that the Nigerian Government, in 2020, mulled the idea of declaring the facilities Critical National Infrastructure, why would any state hallucinate into shutting the facilities which are deemed very critical to the health of any government and its various operations?

Meanwhile, some very interesting things are happening in the telecommunications industry; some policy flops and some little blackmail, either by way of confusing the people or probably just harassing them into silence in the face of overwhelming failure in nearly every sphere of life, security most affected. It might just actually be an orchestrated diversionary spin! The days ahead will be interesting and, on these pages, we promise to serve some salubrious delicacies.