As the country continues in its drive to achieve complete Digital Switch-Over (DSO) before the tenure of this administration ends, the NTA-Star, (StarTimes), and the Integrated Television Services, (ITS), have entered into a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to fast-track this move.
Speaking at the MoU signing ceremony yesterday, in Abuja, the Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, said the MoU is a game-changer in the quest of the administration to achieve complete DSO before their tenure elapses. With this MoU, ITS will utilise the structures and facilities of NTA-Star, a terrestrial PayTV platform, spread across the country, for signal distribution.
He said the MoU, which is in line with the Government White Paper on transition from analogue to digital terrestrial broadcasting in Nigeria, lays the foundation for a working relationship between the two entities to drive the rollout of the DSO in the country.At the moment, NTA-Star has over 70 transmission sites spread across 35 States and the FCT, thereby effectively covering a large portion of this country with their signals. We will strive to cover at least 70% of the country with Digital Terrestrial Television (DTT) signal and then deploy Direct-To-Home (DTH) to provide 30% signal to areas in difficult terrains such as riverine and mountainous areas, he stated.
Mohammed further said that henceforth, the set-up boxes (decoders) of NTA-Star will have multiple encryptions, which will enable viewers to enjoy free view content alongside paid content. He noted that the MoU will open the floodgates for channels to be licensed by NBC, thereby creating jobs and enhancing television experience with quality and compelling content.
In his address, the Director-General of National Broadcasting Commission (NBC), Balarabe Shehu Illelah, said this digital revolution will create wealth of opportunities for the teeming youth, through the set-up box manufacturing and distribution value-chain. This is in addition to having a better reception of signals and diverse channels which address the issue of digital divide between urban and rural populace”, he stated.
Economically, the project will boost our revenue generation from the resale of spectrum and job opportunities from free TV installation, activation and maintenance. By this, we are expecting to transit the over 30 million TV households in Nigeria to digital broadcasting in the next few weeks. More significantly, we expect Nigeria to, within a couple of months, switch-off analogue transmission in particular states that were already switched on and begin to harness the full potentials of a digital economy, he added.
It is important to emphasise that, NBC has, in line with the provision of the DSO White Paper, separated the function of broadcast signal distributor from broadcast content provider, he further stated.
