Danbatta: Facing the challenge of NCC reform
Orhii, EFCC and the media
Nigeria has had a succession of eminently qualified technocrats to run the nation’s telecommunications sector since its liberalisation. That must be one of the reasons that sector has contributed significantly to the country’s GDP. Beginning from February 2000 with the pioneer Executive Vice-Chairman (EVC), Engr. Ernest Ndukwe, who served for two terms of five years each, to the immediate past EVC, Dr. Eugene Juwah whose term began in 2010, and the incumbent, Prof. Umar Garba Danbatta, who is just about settling down to a daunting task, these men have each paraded intimidating career profiles.
Ndukwe had the hard task of laying a working foundation for a private-sector-driven, public-sectorregulated telecoms sector, an operation which for the sheer scale and dynamics of the Nigerian economy, was no mean task. Juwah took on the responsibility of sustaining the gains and deepening the growth in the sector. Prof. Danbatta is expected to set out a blueprint that will lead to the realisation of the broadband master-plan as well as straighten out many regulatory oversights that should deliver to Nigerians world class telecoms and ICT services.
It says a lot about the seriousness with which the Buhari administration takes the telecoms industry that in naming Juwah’s successor, it went for a man tailor-made for the job.
My inbox was inundated with news alerts about the visit by the Director General of National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), Dr Paul Orhii, to the office of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
Although the headlines heralding the content of the emails were diverse, the message they conveyed was uniform in giving the impression that the anti-graft agency has clamped down on Dr Orhii.
This would be contrary to the later portions of these same stories that offered detailed explanation about how NAFDAC has issued a statement to the effect that its helmsman voluntarily visited the EFCC to clarify misconceptions that have been traced to infighting within the agency.
But, in what should send alarm ringing in our collective consciousness,
Born in Danbatta Local Government Area of Kano State, Prof. Danbatta obtained a Bachelors in Engineering, Masters of Science and doctorate degrees from the Technical University of Wroclaw in Poland and the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology, United Kingdom, respectively.
For 28 years, he worked as a lecturer in the Department of Electrical Engineering, Faculty of Technology, at Bayero University Kano, where he taught courses in telecommunications engineering and electronics. At different times, he held appointments as the Head of Department and Dean of the Faculty of Technology.
He also served as the deputy and acting Dean of Student Affairs, Administrator of the Works and Estate Department and Director of the Centre for Information Technology (CIT) - the university’s ICT hub. A hands-on administrator, he was at various times chairman or member of more than 60 university committees and task forces.
Outside Bayero University, he has served as chairman or member to over 20 committees, prominent among which was the chairmanship of the Implementation Committee of Kano State University of Science and Technology, Wudil, after which he was appointed as pioneer deputy and acting vice-chancellor when the university took off in 2001. It is from science and tech the story has taken on additional layers of distortion which will likely get amplified when it makes the round among those who have lesser resources and capacity to analyse what transpired at the agency.
First, we are back to those sad days when investigation is equated with conviction. Note that in this case, we are not even talking about investigation but about a chief executive officer, who has either voluntarily or by invitation reported to shed further light on allegations made about his office and the agency he oversees.
This same mind set was at the root of our years of motion without movement, when we thought the nation was tackling corruption head on. We got all the media hype, but when the closing bell went there was no arraignment not to talk of university that he got “poached” for a bigger national assignment.
He has tutored more than 60 PhD, MEng and BEng projects in the diverse areas of telecommunications and has also served as external examiner to seven universities and polytechnics. He is an assessor, technical reviewer and editorial member to eight research journals. He is a recipient of 18 distinguished awards and certificates of honour.
A COREN registered engineer and member of the Nigerian Society of Engineers (NSE), Prof. Danbatta, served two terms of five years as a member of Council for the Regulation of Engineering in Nigeria (COREN).
He has to his credit more than 50 articles in journals, conference proceedings and technical reports. He is also author of a book titled Elements of Static Engineering Electromagnetics. He was the vice president of the Digital Bridge Institute (DBI), International Centre for Advanced Communications Studies, which was established in 2004 by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) to build capacity for the Nigerian/African telecom industry in the diverse areas of information and communication technology (ICT).
While at DBI he developed expertise in major areas of ICT implementation, policy and regulation including convictions because we have collectively agreed to inflate the true import of processes.
Secondly, the media frenzy that trailed the visit of Orhii to the EFCC office that Monday clearly confirms what the agency has been harping on that - there is a cartel in the drug and food business whose members are hell bent on tarnishing his image hiding under the newly declared war against corruption by President Muhammadu Buhari.
If this attempt is allowed it is a matter of time before the cabal in different sectors would shove out the leaderships that stand in their path by hiding under the anticorruption crusade.
But, we have as a people gotten to the stage where we should be more circumspect. The petitioner was in charge Regulation of the Telecommunications Sector of the Nigerian Economy; Competition, Interconnection and Price Regulations in a Developing Economy; Issues concerning Authorisation of Telecommunications Services in a Developing Economy; Strategies for Ensuring Universal Access and Service to Telecommunications Services; Strategies Towards Effective Spectrum Management in a Developing Economy; Issues on Institutional and Legal Framework for Effective Regulation of Telecommunications Services; and New and Emerging Technologies and Impact on Regulation of the Telecommunications Sector of a Developing Economy.
Like his two predecessors, Prof. Danbatta’s feet are primed for the shoes he now wears. To use a cliché, he is a square peg in a square hole. This means that with the Nigerian Communications Commission under his charge, there are possibilities for the greater involvement of local inputs into the ICT sector. Nigeria could do with the cerebral rigour this professor brings to the table. There is hope that the industry’s contribution to the GDP which was calculated at less than 0.5% in 2001 and rose to 6% in 2012, will achieve the long-desired double digit growth under the new helmsman. of the finances of NAFDAC during all the period detailed in his petition but he conveniently omitted to mention what roles he played in the transactions just as he was mute on what kept him on the post until the re-organisation that peeved him.
We should be asking if this whistleblower would have journeyed down his present trajectory if the status quo had remained. He has also not responded to the position that the petition was the handwork of drug counterfeiting cabal bent on hamstringing the agency.
We collectively stand the risk if this new trend continues. Those who should be clamped down by regulators cook up accusations against the public official with the responsibility of oversight and the official is distracted with having to respond to frivolous petitions.
That is what appears to be going on, but to set the records straight Orhii was only invited to explain and as a man with nothing to hide he spent just a couple of hours with the commission to offer his response to what would eventually turn out to be a frivolous petition.
Ohio returned home to Nigeria with his international reputation and connections to better the lot of the citizenry, and further improve the image of NAFDAC by building upon what he met on ground, among them building of world class laboratories to test our food, drugs before administration on citizenry. Under Orhi we now have made-in-Nigeria drugs competing with other drugs in the market.
Mr Tivlumun Kenneth is a public