Daily Independent (Lagos)
Aaron Ukodie
17 November 2008
(Page 2 of 2)
He also noted how not long ago, Managing Director of Company Engr. Rufai, did say that Nigeria would soon earn about 1billion USD yearly from services of the Satellite which would come from lease of its transponders!
"What that means in practical terms is that in one year alone, the company would have generated revenue more than the total investment in the project!
From beginning of this project, I had foreseen trouble based on past experience in this country whereby Government business is generally regarded as nobody's business and the haste accompanying the implementation of this particular project.
"I have had cause to wonder if there was any business plan to justify the huge investment and whether the project could not have been executed at a lower cost to the nation.
"My fears got confirmed as soon as the project was launched and rather commencing marketing of various products available as touted by Nigcomsat, the company went to town asking Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) to grant it licence to do last mile which meant that it was abandoning its initial core business of providing satellite services, a somehow lucrative monopolistic segment of the telecommunications industry, to providing direct service to customers.
"In trying to hoodwink the nation, Nigcomsat had issued statement to the effect that granting it licence would help it crash tariff as presently offered by the telecommunications companies. For popular effect, it stated that the company would offer one minute of call at N10! Immediately I got this information, my fears heightened because something told me that someone had started to play games with an unsuspecting Nigeria. It was as simple as that.
According to him at the time the corporation canvassed for GSM license it had been aware of the problems of the satellite and was trying to find an escape route by cleverly sneaking to start provision of direct telecommunications services as a response to a possibly failing venture.
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Hold the builders, launchers and those involved in the contract for repayment back to the federal govt.