ICT Infrastructure: Africa’s Achilles Heel
By Mercy Wambui, Communication Officer, ECA
04 February 2005

ECA chief K.Y.Amoako has warned that underdeveloped infrastructure continues to be the “Achilles heel” of Africa’s information society.

Speaking at the opening ceremony of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) Africa Regional Preparatory Conference, held in Accra from 2-4 February 2005, he decried the daunting constraint to the use of Information and Communications Technology (ICTs) caused by an outdated telecommunications infrastructure.

Mr Amoako called for speeding up the improvement of national legal and regulatory environments in order to facilitate the effective introduction of ICTs in various essential fields..

“The other unresolved issue is financing mechanisms for the information society,” he said, urging a bold and innovative approach in this regard. “Africa needs to show that it is ready to carry more of its own load in this area.”

According to Mr Amoako, these challenges could only be overcome through a political commitment by African leaders, financial commitment from international and local partners and the involvement of all stakeholders.

Rwandan President Paul Kagame detailed expounded his country’s second phase of an ECA-sponsored National Information and Communication Infrastructure (NICI) plan which, he said, was geared to “increase access and contribute to a genuine information society as action plans alone will not deliver the desired results”.

“Through public-private partnerships, we are now bringing broadband through a fibre-optic network to our capital Kigali and aggregating our efforts to create a favourable investment climate and to expand this infrastructure to other parts of the country,” he noted.

Touching on Rwanda’s efforts to move on from the traumatic impact of the 1994 genocide, he said ICT applications were now being used in government operations and services and in particular, as an instrument to enhance unity and reconciliation, to strengthen the participatory justice system known as “Gacaca”.

“As things are now, African countries are not adequately reaping the benefits which accrue from being neighbours,” he said. “Only regional integration will contribute to the development of the Global Information Society, as it will yield economies of scale, generate demand and capital, while at the same time strengthening bilateral ties.”

He added that Rwanda’s hopes for further infrastructure expansion were pinned on New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD) to promote regional ventures such as the East African Submarine Cable System.

Ghanaian president J.A Kufuor pointed to the strides made in Ghana through a strong ICT policy and plan and the establishment of the cutting-edge Kofi Annan Centre for ICT excellence, sponsored by the government of India.

Tunisian Prime Minister Mohamed Ghannouchi, highlighted the preparations currently underway for the second phase of the WSIS summit to be held in November 2005 in Tunis, saying that 400,000 dinars had been earmarked by the Tunisian government alone for this event.

The opening ceremony was ushered in by a spectacular display of Ghanaian traditional dancing and drumming, a video show on ICT challenges and keynote addresses by high-level representatives of government and international organizations.

Pre-conference workshops, held ahead of the summit, finalized recommendations for a regional action plan that will serve as a basis for a united African negotiating position in Tunis in November this year.