By MKPE ABANG
Each time the matter is mentioned either in the print or electronic media reports, I always felt like shutting my eyes and ears lest my blood shoots up again. Unfortunately, like the Africans say, unless and until the child stops crying, the mother never stops singing, until the matter is settled and settled well and satisfactorily, it will continue to haunt us – all of us.
For five clear years now, going on six, an otherwise ambitious and necessary security scheme, which intent and design was to put some major cities of the country – in the first instance as pilot schemes – in the full and constant view security agencies, the National Public Security Communications System (NPSCS) project has become something of a national disgrace rather than an asset that it was designed to be.
The background to this project goes back to when late President Umar Musa Yar’Adua paid a state visit to the Peoples’ Republic of China in 2008. Those who have not been to China may not appreciate the enormity of efforts that country of over a billion people, put in to keep the country safe – from trouble makers either from within or from outside the shores of history land.
Obviously impressed that China can maintain such high level of safety and security for the entire country, of 9,596,961 square kilometres, President Yar’Adua, whose country, Nigeria, has only a fraction of that size – just 923,768 km² and a population of 160 million then as against China’s 1.25 billion (currently Nigeria’s population is put at 170 million while China’s is at 1.357 billion – thought he could gain from the technological ingenuity of the Chinese. That was indeed, good thinking; wasn’t it?
That was what gave rise to what has become known today as the National Public Security Communications System. Unlike many uninformed people would have it, this project was not merely the aspect of installing cameras and surveillance equipment in Abuja, Port Harcourt and Lagos as the pilot scheme. It encompassed all of that. After all, neither in China is such gargantuan scheme merely for close circuit television cameras only for Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen; nor is it the case with similar projects in Britain merely for CCTV cameras for London, and a couple of other cities.
So, whereas that visit gave rise to the project and this was awarded in 2010 – interestingly at a time that Nigeria was yet to drift into the situation of endless callous carnage that we are today – if that project had been followed through to the very end, so much that challenges us today might have been mitigated. But unfortunately that hasn’t been the case.
As a matter of fact, that project emanated from a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between ZTE Corporation of China and the federal government of Nigeria during that state visit by President Yar’Adua in March 2008.
Looking at the project in total, it was designed as an integrated digital trunking communication system designed to provide a robust, reliable, secure and independent multimedia communications system (voice, video and data) for the Police and all other security agencies of Nigeria, employing global best technologies.
The project was approved for implementation at the cost of US$470,000,000 counterpart funded by Nigeria at 15% with the 85% balance provided through a Preferential Buyer Credit by the China Export-Import Bank (EXIM) at annual interest rate of 2.5% with a loan period of 20 years inclusive of 10 years moratorium.
To pick aspects of the project, that have even been executed, completed and delivered, but whose owners are not or have not maintained it for it to deliver on its designed purpose, is to pretend that nothing had happened.
For the purpose of information, the NPSCS is comprised of five main components/subsystems as follows:
The GoTA which operates through 2Nos. Main Switch Centres (MSC) with one each in Abuja and Lagos, 12 Base Station Controllers (BSCs) and 675 Base Transmitting Station (BTS) sites providing the Internet Protocol (IP) Cloud for the various applications to which the project can be applied. The GoTA supports the deployment of 1,500,000 subscriber lines;
The E-policing Subsystem facilitates the deployment of E-policing databases;
Video Conferencing Subsystem provides for video conferencing by all Commands of the Nigeria Police Force (NPF) with the Force Headquarters (FHQ) and among themselves.
Coalition Emergency Response Subsystem will empower emergency response and provide a national platform for emergency calls by citizens to the Nigeria Police nationwide. Under this subsystem, six (6) mobile emergency communication vehicles will also be deployed.
Video Surveillance Subsystem, under which 2,000 CCTV cameras are installed in Abuja and Lagos as part of the project, is perhaps the easily visible aspect. It also includes the application of solar solutions in the subsystem which was informed by the electricity power challenges in the country and the need to ensure sustained operations of the cameras wherever installed.
It is to be noted that the monitoring or main control rooms are at the police headquarters, having been fully executed and implemented.
So, instead of wasting much energy and time on name-calling over just an aspect of the project, namely the installation of CCTV cameras in the cities of Lagos, Abuja, Port Harcourt and Yenagoa, Nigerians should be asking themselves the right question: why was the project, which had been executed by ZTE, never deployed or kept alive by the Nigerian government?
If anyone was left in doubt that it is indeed the Nigerian government that has failed or refused to keep the project functioning, the words of former managing director of the Nigerian Satellite Communications Limited (NigComSat), Mr. Timasaniyu Ahmed-Rufai, in his presentation to the National Assembly’s ad hoc committee investigating the project, should be enough food for thought.
He stated clearly:
“As the Project Consultant, I stand by every payment that was made and every decision taken on the project. The project was completed, tested and every component was working.
“It is erroneous for anyone to call the project a CCTV project because the Video Surveillance System (VSS) is even less than 8 per cent of the project. There were five components and they were all completed. We need to be straight in how we discuss this issue.”
When asked why the cameras in Abuja and Lagos were not working currently, Ahmed-Rufai likened what happened to someone who bought a brand new car and refused to fuel it.
“They had to power down the backbone for the communication system because government was not forthcoming in maintaining and operating the system. It is a complete communication system, there were phones for security agencies, they were special phones for security agencies which some people decided to lock up somewhere.
“There were emergency communication vehicles, they were all delivered. People were trained, from the police and other agencies but somehow some people decided not to operate the system. Those cameras depend on a backbone that has over 670 base stations. Those BTS have to be powered for the cameras to work,” he said.
That leaves Nigerians with one clear question – and this shall be directed at the Nigerian government. Why, just why has this project not been implemented? Rather than repeatedly being under the wrong impression that the contractor, in this case, ZTE corporation, ‘did not execute the project’, now that we have a crown witness speaking from a point of authority, we must then rise up and look at where our government has failed to do its bit on this – namely, to deploy and maintain the project.
We have heard of stories, for instance where ordinary diesel is not delivered to certain sites where BTS are installed, to keep them functioning. We have heard of stories where some visible aspects of the project, such as CCTV cameras and solar panels in cities such as Lagos, Abuja and Port Harcourt, have been stolen or vandalised with no one protecting them or bringing those who steal or vandalise them to book. What of the training and continuous training that ought to go on for the officers and men of the Nigeria Police Force and other security agencies in understanding, manning and managing the project?
Nigerians think and expect that once a project of such importance is delivered, it will take care of itself, it will maintain itself, and it will even police the entire country by itself. What fools we are to think so!
But we are lucky; yes, because the company that executed the project is still here. Are there aspects of the project that we have allowed to rot because they have remained fallow for much too long? Yes! So, what to do? Call on the original contractor, to evaluate the cost of rejuvenating the project and bringing it back to life again; and, the cost of training those who must now on maintain and project and deploy it for the security of all and sundry.
Thus, the question: Can President Muhammadu Buhari, who came on also on the strength of providing security for the country, and who has not been able as yet, to rout out the Boko Haram insurgents despite his December 2015 deadline, bring change to the National Security Project? He can, and must, if he wishes to defeat insurgents in the north east region and militants in the Niger Delta region who are now resurfacing.
On a note of warning though: security is much more intricate to be discussed the way we have been going about it virtually at every open square, including the National Assembly; yes, we can discuss the cost and award of the contract – which are the prerogative of the President. But the final implementation is better left to the experts.
Or, can anyone tell me how London, Washing DC, Paris, New York, Beijing, Shanghai and all other leading cities of the world are being secured? Is their countries’ security system the subject of discussion on every open space? President Buhari it’s your turn; posterity is waiting to judge you.