By Olabisi Olaleye
Executive Vice Chairman of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), Prof Umar Garba Danbatta has said Nigeria needs at leastt 80,000 telecommunication base stations(BTS) to actualize her dream of joining the club of countries working toward making Internet of Things (IoT) a reality by leveraging 4G and 5G networks.
He disclosed this known at the House Representatives’ Ad Hoc Committee investigating the health implications of mounting telecommunications masts close to building, yesterday in Abuja,
The EVC further said that the country currently has less than 50,000 base stations.
“3G, 4G going to 5G networks are going to usher this country into smart applications, the Internet of Things or the smart world and cities we are talking about. And of course because of the additional burden on infrastructure, the present capacity of telecom infrastructure is grossly inadequate to cater for these additional platforms or services we talk about’
“Therefore we will need from 70,000 to 80,000 base transceiver masts to be able to provide the effective capacity that’s needed to deploy 4G going to 5G,” he said while responding to questions from members of the ad hoc committee.
Danbatta urged all levels of government in the country synergize with NCC a view to achieving the target, noting that the United Kingdom (UK), with a population of almost one third of Nigeria already has close to 60,000 masts.
On concerns about health implications to exposure to electromagnetic field, Danbatta said researches so far conducted in the area have not indicated any adverse health concerns.