By Chinenye Anuforo

SecureID, manufacturer of smart cards, has bagged the GSMA certificate, which was shown to the minister of communications and digital economy, Isa Pantami, when he visited the company last week.

Pantami, who was represented by the executive vice-chairman and CEO of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), Umar Garba Danbatta, at the event,  showered encomiums on Kofo Akinkugbe, CEO of SecureID, saying the company set a precedent for other Nigerians.

According to him, this is the first Nigerian company meeting the requirement to receive this certification in the whole of Africa, and the third facility on the continent.

He said: “I am very happy and, on behalf of the minister, congratulate this company and to learn that they have been already certified by the Global System of Mobile Association. It is a great milestone.

The minister urged Nigerians to patronize the company’s products, which meet the same international standards as counterparts abroad.

“We must patronise our own products produced locally to the quality of international standards. I think it is a testimony that Nigerian companies are doing well and we must encourage them with patronage.”

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That is  called local content,  we can’t have companies like this that produce with international standard and still go outside the country to do this. We as regulators shall look into it and see how we bring in companies in the sector to patronize them”, he said.

On her part, Akinkugbe explained that the company invested a lot of resources and manpower to achieve the certification. She said the company will not rest on its oars but will continue to aim for the best in order to achieve greater heights.

Commending the quest of honours, she said: “We are very happy to have the honourable Minister Isa Patani represented by the Executive vice chairman of the NCC, Danbata to have come to launch first of all the GSMA certification that we have just received and also to open and launch our digital solution.

Akinkugbe said that having tour around the factory, she thinks her guests saw that  production of smart cards is possible even at highest quality in Nigeria.

“They were very impressed with what they saw and we took them round all the quality protocols and we also have them understand what the GSMA certification means.

“We then took them to the subsidiary of the digital company called SIB Digital to look at the several digital solutions that we have in our portfolio.