Remmy Nweke bags Deutsche Welle, FOSSFA Reporter award 2010

Lead Content Strategist at ITRealms Online and Senior Reporter and Head of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) desk at Champion Newspapers Limited, Lagos-Nigeria,Remmy Nweke, has bagged the first-ever African Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) Reporter award.

The award which was the first of its kind by the Free and Open Source Foundation for Africa (FOSSFA) and Deutsche Welle (DW) under FOSSWAY project, was presented to Mr. Nweke in Accra, Tuesday night by the Director, Deutsche Welle Online, Mr. Thomas Bastian in company of FOSSFA chairperson, Ms Nnenna Nwakanma, as part of the weeklong fourth Idlelo conference organized at the State House, Banquet Hall, Accra.

Speaking at the ceremony, chairperson, FOSSFA, Ms Nwakanma noted that the award was open to Africans living on the continent, authors of articles or broadcasts that were published or aired in the last two years and were also made available both in the traditional media and new media.

Winning entries, she pointed out was an article described as valuable to an African audience, which showed clarity in communication and significantly explaining, interpreting and reporting the impact of FOSS on the development of Africa and recognizing newsworthiness thereof.

Therefore, she said that Mr. Nweke’s piece on ‘Open Source as business solution’ met the aforementioned criterion based on the voices reflected and juries declaration, therefore, it was pronounced the best.

She also promised that FOSSFA would continue to support African media practitioners, even as she solicited for more reportage on the activities of group on the continent.

Also speaking, Mr. Bastian of DW said that they are partnering on the media award project because Africa is very important continent to them, disclosing that the winning article was well articulated and would be serialized in one of their projects in Latin America and particularly Brazil to showcase the kind of efforts Africans are making in FOSS adaptation.

He equally congratulated Mr. Nweke accompanied by his wife and a professional journalist, Nkemdilim, for coming up with the award winning piece and urged him to keep up the touch.

The Chief executive, Mandriva West Africa, Mr. Dele Ajisomo, in his congratulatory message, said that Nigeria is proud of Mr. Nweke’s achievements on the continent and asked him to remain steadfast.

Mr. Nweke is not new to professional prizes as he had in the past won the Siemens African Profile Award for 2004 and 2005; thus becoming the first Nigerian to win such awards on excellence in science and technology reporting twice in addition to a merit awarded him in 2008.

In addition, he is a pioneer Nigerian editorial board member of the Highway Africa News Agency (HANA) based at Rhodes University, Grahamstown, South Africa, and won the second prize in Local Content Application category at the African Information Society Initiative (AISI) awards in 2005 organized by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) based in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

In 2006, Mr. Nweke was honour with the Hewlett Packard (HP) Nigeria’s top prize for Nigerian ICT journalists in technology reporting, whereas he was the first runner up in the Nigerian IT & Telecom Awards print category.

Currently, a Master of Arts student of University of Malta in Contemporary Diplomacy, Nweke was at the Global Knowledge Partnership (GKP-07) in Malaysia, where he took the second prize in ICT Research and Innovations category of AISI.

While at the 10th Highway Africa conference-06, he was adjudged the SABC-HANA Journalist of the Year in recognition and promotion of creative, innovative and appropriate use of new media technology on the continent, even as he emerged the Publicity Secretary, Nigeria Internet Group (NIG) a not-profit organisation.

A founding member of the Joint Action Committee on ICT Awareness (JACITAD) and focal point for the African ICTMedia for Nigeria, Mr. Nweke, and last year was nominated into the International WHO'S WHO of Professionals in 2009 Edition.

The ceremony was graced by the Director, ICT at ECOWAS secretariat Abuja, Dr. Sola Afolabi who also represented the Ghanaian Minister of Communications, Mr. Haruna Idrisu as chairman of the occasion, former Microsoft Country Manager for West Africa, Mr. Chinenye Mba-Uzoukwu, Developers Team Leader, Microsoft West Africa, Mr. Ken Spann, one of the fathers of Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) in Latin America, Mr. Jon Hall, General Manager, Zain Ghana, Director-General Kofi Annan Indian Centre of Excellence in ICT, Ms Dorothy Gordon among FOSSFA council and members across the continent and partners.


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Conficker worm latest:7m computers infected worldwide – Working group

An estimated seven million personal computers worldwide may have been infected by the Conficker worm, according to a report by the Conficker Working Group (CWG) at the weekend.

CWG also said it’s maintaining visual timeline and chronology of Conficker to track historical, current and future events.

The Conficker infection rate, the report also said, has remained high for B and C variants but has been on declining curve for C and E, noting that as at October 2009 snapshot by the Shadowserver Foundation, which estimated that the number of systems infected with Conficker rated as A, B, C variants were placed at approximately seven million.

The Conficker Working Group (CWG)-led by the global coordinating body for cyberspace, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) and a number of concerned entities, including Microsoft, Verisign among others, finally released the summary of its joint counter-measures to battle the dreaded worm that hit cyberspace over two years ago.

The Conficker Working Group, thus, resolved to maintain visual timeline and chronology of Conficker “to track historical, current and future events,” stressing that activities to detect Conficker variants and remediate Conficker-infected hosts would undoubtedly continue for some time, but they would relent.

“This is inevitable given the millions of infected computers and historically marginal success in remediating malware,” part of the report read.

Lessons learned during the Conficker containment period, which began since the last quarter of 2008, according to a copy of the review summary made available to ITRealms Online by the Senior Security Technologist at ICANN, Mr. Dave Piscitello, indicated that this report provides a chronology of events related to the containment of the Conficker worm.

He also said that Security and Domain Name System (DNS) communities are working to devise long-term and sustainable approaches for dealing with not only Conficker, but also future, similar threats.

On the importance of roles in Conficker Working Group, he said, that all the actions related to mitigating the Conficker worm were not directly nor entirely within the remit of any individual CWG participant, but throughout the chronology of Conficker events, all the collaborating parties performed roles that were appropriate to their organizations’ core competencies, namely the malware researchers, reverse engineered the dropper cum installer, traffic analysis engineers identified the loci of infestations.

ICANN, he said for instance, facilitated communications between registries and parties who compiled the domain lists, and registry operators blocked registrations of Conficker domains.

The collaborating parties tried to adhere to the best practices of public disclosure of security incidents and events by maintaining a low profile, protecting sensitive information, and sharing only information that the ad hoc partnership agreed to share.

Several CWG members, he said, publicly expressed their surprise and gratitude for member willingness to engage in the Conficker containment, noting that many security and registry organizations had not encountered circumstances such as those Conficker posed and thus did not have communications channels in place to coordinate containment efforts.

But members indicated that ICANN’s ability to facilitate and expedite communications with Top Level Domain (TLD) registries accelerated processes that would under other circumstances have challenging if not impossible to obtain during the windows of opportunity Conficker afforded them.

“It provides an introduction and brief description of the worm and its evolution, but its primary focus is to piece together the post-discovery and -analysis events, describe the containment measures chronologically, and describe the collaborative effort to contain the spread of the worm,” he said.

According to him, the authors tried to capture lessons learned during a containment period spanning nearly a year and described recent activities that attempt to apply the lessons learned so that the security and Domain Name Systems (DNS) communities could be better prepared for future attacks that exploit the global DNS.

He noted that members of the team includes ICANN's Security and Stability Advisory Committee (SSAC), individual security researchers, and some ICANN registries who were invited to comment or review the report.

Noting that the Conficker worm first appeared in October 2008 and quickly earned as much notoriety as Code l, Red1, Blaster 2, Sasser 3 and , SQL Slammer 4.

The infection was found in both home and business networks, including large multi-national enterprise networks and attempts to estimate the populations of Conficker infected hosts at any given time have varied widely, but all estimates exceed millions of personal computers.

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ATCON: How Omo-Ettu emerged president

The Association of Telecom Companies of Nigeria (ATCON) recently held its Annual General Meeting cum election in Lagos. REMMY NWEKE who was there reports on how the winners emerged.

A few weeks ago, the Association of Telecommunications Companies of Nigeria (ATCON) held its Annual General Meeting and National Executive Council (NEC) election for 2010.

Announcing the readiness, the Executive Secretary, Mr. Ajibola Olude, said that they looked forward to welcoming both old and new members among others, stressing that the chairman of the electoral committee would be appointed on that day, maintaining that ATCON strongly believes that for Nigerian telecommunications market to remain vibrant and relevant.

The association, he said, plans to keep on advocating for some fundamentals like good quality service and zero tolerance on multiple taxation to name a few. Hence the election of the national executive council has become imperative to underscore ATCON’s needs for credible, pro-active, intelligent and good resources managers to steer its leadership in the next two years to the next level.

“We look forward to welcoming both old and new members, media partners and other colleagues to this interactive and exciting association’s event. As an added measure to see that you get notified on time so you can adjust your schedules accordingly, we have attached a soft copy of the invitation which you can take as a firm invitation to attend the event,” he said.

As proposed, on April 30 at the Golden Gate Restaurant, Ikoyi-Lagos, members of ATCON and interested stakeholders took over the second floor of the restaurant with the welcome address read by the immediate past president, Dr. Emmanuel Ekuwem.

Ekuwem’s stewardship at AGM:
According to him, high point of the AGM was the election of new officers into the ATCON’s NEC, as well as rendering of his report of stewardship, after completion of his second term in office as National President of ATCON on Friday, April 30, 2010, recalling that he was first voted into office on April 21, 2006 and re-elected in April 2008.

Though the constitution of ATCON allows for a maximum of three terms of two years each, Ekuwem had long indicated that he would not go for a third term, based on the reasons he proffered including that other professionals in the industry have one idea or the other to offer towards the growth of the ATCON in addition to the development of the Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) sector in the country, and so, others should be given an opportunities to contribute their quota equally.

It was also on record that ATCON presided over by Ekuwem performed upto expectation, mostly initiating some good works and activities that in deed enhanced the accelerated expansion of the ICT frontiers in Nigeria, since April 2006 and 2010, hosted about seven industry-based roundtables including Telecom Investment & Finance Forum, Telecom Franchise & Virtual Operations, Stakeholders’ Summit on Energy & Power Crisis, Nigerian Content Development Summit, ComBIT African Expo, Nigerian ICT Education Summit among others.

He also highlighted that the Telecom Investment & Finance Forum, it was designed to address the challenges of the absence of long term funding from banks and non-banks financial institutions for telecom projects in Nigeria.

Held in 2006, he said that Telecom Investment & Finance Forum, encouraged the recapitalized banks in Nigeria to consider lending to the information and communication technologies (ICT) sector, as ATCON also secured the participation of regional and international finance and funding institutions as well as solicited their assistance in facilitation of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in the Nigeria ICT sector.

On the Telecom Franchise & Virtual Operations, which held in 2007, he said, was to stimulate further expansion of ICT service to underserved and unserved areas in the country.

This forum, according to him, discussed opportunities in telecom franchising and virtual operations, stressing that also looked at the policy and regulatory framework that would create an enabling environment for small and medium scale investors to participate gainfully in the provisioning of ICT services especially in rural Nigeria where big operators do not consider economically viable to invest in.

Participants, he noted, called on the Universal Service Provision Fund (USPF) to empower local entrepreneurs who show interest in taking up franchise of big operators to remote Nigeria so that the rural population would also benefit from the boom in Nigeria’s ICT market.

Stakeholders’ Summit on Energy & Power Crisis, Ekuwem pointed out, addressed the failure of Nigeria’s energy and power sector to provide energy and power on a constant basis to support industrial and other economic activities in Nigeria.
ATCON, he said, considered it a national shame that industries were folding up in Nigeria due to the failure of the energy and power sector to live up to its billings.

Above all, participants lamented that ICT operators have had to provide services at great costs as they also had to generate power when they should have been concentrating efforts at improving service quality, even as experts suggested investments in alternative power sources, including biofuels, as a way out of the challenging situation.

ATCON, he noted, raised alarm over hawking of SIM Pack in the country and called for accreditation and registration, recalling he urged for SIM packs accreditation and registration at the Annual General Meeting (AGM) of ATCON held in April 2008.

Additionally, he took the gospel of SIM pack accreditation and registration to every ICT forum he attended in Nigeria, until the Nigeria Communication Commission (NCC) bought into the vision as well as national security agencies.

The NCC, in its usual proactive and professional manner, took the idea seriously and set up an industry working group, which eventually led to the implementation of the SIM registration exercise slated for March, 2010. There is no doubt that the system will help in checking security risks posed by anonymous callers who issue threats to innocent and unsuspecting persons in our society.

How they new exco emerged:
After his address, the Electoral Committee was set up with Dr. Godwin Bakare of Godwin Engineers as chairman and includes Mr. Godwin Morgan formerly an executive secretary, ATCON, publisher, e-Businesslife magazine, Mrs. Ufuoma Daro and Chief Commercial Officer, IHS, Mr. Gbenga Onakomaiya.

At the end of the election keenly contested, the managing partner of Telecom Answers Associates (TAA), Mr. Titi Omo-Ettu, emerged the president, Association of Telecommunications Companies of Nigeria (ATCON) with a total of 23 votes against his opponent and former Vice President, ATCON and chief executive, DisCom Limited, Mr. Bayo Banjo, who scored 17 votes.

Speaking after the election, the chairman of the committee, Dr. Godwin Bakare tasked the new officers to ensure they deliver to the organisation and fill the remaining vacant offices.

Omo-Ettu took over from Dr. Ekuwem, who is the Executive Vice Chairman, Teledom International Group and was in the office for two terms of two years each.

Also, the former second vice president and chief executive of Voicewaves Networks Limited, Mr. Gerry Ekesiani was elevated into the office of the first vice president with a total of 22 votes against his counterpart from Kinten Telecom Limited, Mr. Olusola Teniola. Others who scaled through the election were Barrister Adewale Jones as second vice president, David Roberts, national secretary, Ms Maureen Egbuna, publicity secretary, Mr. Myke Ofili, treasurer, while Messrs Tony Nwosu was returned as the Co-coordinator, Auxiliary Service Providers, even as Mac Danielles Ighedosa of Diyeem Global Concept and Akinlabi Akinbo from AAA Infotek were retained as Coordinator of Enhanced Services and Consulting Group in that order.

Presently, Omo-Ettu is the National Vice president, Council for the Regulation of Engineering in Nigeria (COREN), since last year and has over three decades of active participation in the Nigerian telecommunications industry growth after retiring from the services of Nigerian Telecommunications Plc (NITEL) in 1991 and presently consulting and training younger engineers with focus on developmental processes.

Equally, his Lagos-based Cyberschuul specialises on telecommunications training, and is a fellow of several professional organisation including the Nigeria Society of Engineers (NSE), Telecom Executive Management Institute, Canada; memberships of Association of Consulting Engineers, Nigeria; and Nigerian Institute of Management (NIM) among others.

In his acceptance speech, Omo-Ettu on behalf of other newly elected executive, said that his game plan would be anchored on communications with members, consumers on behalf of ATCON members, with the regulator and the government.

Additionally, he said that members should be ready to support the initiative for a powerful database of who they are, where they are and what they do, just as care for their fair market performance would form part of his cardinal points to ensure membership availability and contribution to the association always.

His plan would be a proactive communications strategic to make certain that both the government and regulator are kept on their toes, assuring that he would run an open door policy that is democratic in nature backed up with an updated, proficient secretariat with continuously trained personnel.

For him, it is only those who pay peer nuts that get monkeys as personnel, hence his administration tends to reward excellence and motivate staff as well the executive members, expressing the believe that exco members would be entrenched in the leadership that they can adequately speak on behalf of the organization.

As said by him, succession plan must start as soon as his administration settles down, because time is of the essence and plan must be advanced for implement of projects to make money for ATCON through provision of services to members and make them pay for such services.

ATCON goes into inclusive talk:
The umbrella body of the telecommunications firms in the country under the aegis of Association of Telecommunications Companies of Nigeria (ATCON) has embarked on an inclusive talk process according to the newly elected national president, Mr. Titi Omo-Ettu.

A letter from ATCON’s presidency, soon after, expressed the gratitude of the new executive council committee of ATCON and said that they the process has become necessary following the end of the inaugural meeting of the12-man Executive Committee member, where it was decided that ATCON should advance its immediate plans and focus.

“We will embark on an inclusive talk-process with our members, the regulator, governments, consumers, and other stakeholders to build lasting processes and institutions that will not only secure what we have built thus far, but move us on to other frontiers,” he said, emphasizing that the concept of reaching out would accommodate views and feelings of telecommunications firms who may not even be presently members, but “who as players in the industry, we are determined to take seriously in our plans.”

He pointed out that the objective would be to secure an industry fit for the purpose where all stakeholders could effectively play their respective roles, noting that the pace of development in the industry globally is frenetic and ATCON cannot afford not to keep up, asserting “The ball is firmly in our court.”

ATCON, Omo-Ettu said, would embark on a consultative programme in the coming weeks to canvass ideas from its members, which would form the foundation of the plans to be discussed at the Executive Committee and considered for implementation, disclosing that ATCON relationship with the media, as always, would remain robust, open and reciprocal.

“Our association will, whenever the need arises, study industry developments and issue statements only when we have completed our consultation processes. Our focus will be to publish the truth all the time so as to destroy rumour for all times,” he said, maintaining that his administration would be open and elude reactions to issues considered undeserving of reaction, just as he promised not join issues beyond stating the facts and the truth.

“At this moment, our consultation process is in progress regarding specific issues of industry management such as SIM card registration, sale of NITEL, Number Portability, industry restructuring, tariff management, Quality of Service (QoS), dominance to mention a few,” he said, even as relevant public statements would be issued on completion of the aforementioned consultations.

As the new NEC at ATCON settles down, stakeholders expect a vibrant tenure with the kind of people that eventually emerged at the election, but not without industry analysts observation that one thing that could not save Banjo during the reading of manifesto was the declaration of ‘war’ almost on every other person who may not be in the same page with the association instead of dialogue.

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FOSSFA commends Omatek, urges African patronage

The Free and Open Source Foundation for Africa (FOSSFA) has commended the management of Omatek Computer Plc for its effort in building capacity for the citizens of the continent.

Speaking after leading participants at the ongoing Idlelo Four conference of FOSSFA and Digital Common at the Kofi Annan Centre for Excellence in Information and Communications Technologies (ICT), the chairperson of FOSSFA Council, Ms Nnenna Nwakanma, said they are proud of Omatek and their products.

She also urged Africans, especially the government on the continent to look inward by patronizing the likes of Omatek who provide employment for the citizens of Africa and to help the continent to grow economically.

She advised Africans to forego the mentality of thinking that Africa and Africans because the only nation that can strive in this century are those who have something upstairs.

Nwakanma further made an exclusive appeal to African women and youths to tap into the advantages offered by open source and get exposed in Information Technology (IT), because according to her, it is only those who have knowledge that would survive in the coming centuries.

Welcoming FOSSFA members to the Omatek Factory in Accra, Ghana, the General Manager, Mr. Nana Benneh, expressed delight for the opportunity by FOSSFA members to know what the company is doing and where the two could partner in advancing the African course in ICT.

Taking the group round the factory, the Production Manager, Omatek Ghana, Mr. Saied Onifade, revealed that they currently assemble about 200 Personal Computers (PCs) per day and has plans to delve into solar inverter in Accra, even as they do commercial assembling for people or companies who wish to have branded that are different from Omatek.

He explained that Omatek computers are tropically made to comply with the weather situation in this part of the world.

This, he said, stands Omatek out among the foreign brands which do not conform to these additional features, stressing that every PC after being assembled is sent into the burning room for several hours followed by a system report that would show the composition so as to ensure that every system complies with the Omatek standards.

He pointed out that Omatek originated from Nigeria and has been in the market for over 20 years, although it has just been in Accra for about three years, noting that the Accra factory was set up to serve the Ghana market and other West Africa states.

Onifade further said that Omatek usually load both Microsoft and Open Source (OS) operating systems in every PC so as to give customers the choice.

He went on to disclose that Omatek has partnership with Madriva, an Open Source distributor to load its elearning package in some of the PCs meant for educational institutions in the bid to bridge the gap between the cities and rural communities in Africa.

Equally speaking, a member of FOSSFA council and director-general, Kofi Annan Centre for Excellence in ICT, Ms Dorothy Gordon, applauded participants for creating the time to visit Omatek.

She called for the evaluation of FOSSFA members on the continent and to encourage new membership and grow awareness.

“We need to find out where the user groups are in Africa and who are their contact points and keep in touch with them to drive the open source home,” she asserted.

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DiploFoundation unveils eDiplomat, offers training in Accra

An international non-governmental organisation with offices in Geneva and Malta, Diplo Foundation, has unveiled a new course called eDiplomat, trains over 20 Africans in Accra on Policy and Internet Governance.

Director, DiploFoundation, Dr. Jovan Kurbalija, made this known, weekend, to ITRealms Online recently, saying that the launch events for the e-Diplomacy Initiative, would lead-up to discussion towards the International Conference on E-Diplomacy, to be held in Geneva and Vienna.

The use of e-tools, he said, for diplomatic or international relations activities, would contribute much to making these events lively, interesting and useful for all participants.

As said by him, the Geneva phase would hold today, May 19, 2010 at the World Meteorological Organisation Building, while that of Vienna, has been slated for May 25, 2010, at the Diplomatic Academy – Vienna.

Participants, he said, could register either via e-mail at: edipinfo@diplomacy.edu or on the website: http://edip.diplomacy.edu/regevents.

He also said that his organisation, a non-profit organisation is determined to assist all countries, particularly those with limited resources to participate meaningfully in international relations, hence promoting a multistakeholder approach, involving the participation of international organisation, civil society and other actors in international affairs.

In keeping with Diplo objectives, he said that the organisation through its educational programmes to introduce eDiplomat.

Meanwhile, Diplo Foundation, last weekend, completed capacity building programme for over 20 Africans under its Information and Communications Technology (ICT) Policy and Internet Governance for Africa, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP).

The Accra training was conducted as one of the pre-conference exercises in partnership with Free Open Source Software for Africa (FOSSFA) and Open Source Institute for West Africa (OSIWA), which lasted for three days at the Kofi Annan Centre for Excellence in ICT.

ITRealms Online, gathered that presently, over 300 ACP officials and other specialists of various professional backgrounds including engineering, economy, law, social sciences, languages and culture, media have been lined up for training under the project.

The ACP-ICT programme is financed by the European Development Fund (EDF) with the aim of assisting ACP governments and institutions to design, implement and evaluate their national and regional ICT cum internet policies in addition to addressing intra-ACP needs in developing good practices in ICT policies as well as promoting greater stakeholder awareness.


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eTranzact introduces Genesis chip & PIN cards

In compliance to the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) regulation, eTranzact, one of the nation’s electronic payment system providers, has introduced its Genesis brand of card with chip and PIN.

The Managing Director, eTranzact, Mr. Valentine Obi, said this entails that eTranzact Genesis cards are EMV compliant.

He also said that by releasing these cards into the nation’s market, eTranzact would mop up all its old magnetic cards, which are currently being used by the Nigerian public.

Equally, he said, it would help move the nation towards an advance technological era like other advanced countries where the smartcard payment platform is being actively simplified.

Additionally, this he said, would allow cardholders to be rest assured of continuous security even if their eTranzact cards are compromised.

He explained that in creation of this card, eTranzact had in mind its customers, the end-users of this product in protecting them while giving them Quality of Service (QOS).

“We thought about the uniqueness newness of not only changing it from a magnetic stripe to a Chip and PIN card, but also giving it a unique attribute solely for the safety of the customers and carriers of the Genesis card,” he said.

Mr. Obi stressed that eTranzact could generated codes through customers’ mobile application or web access profile platform.

“eTranzact makes available dynamic PIN as opposed to a static PIN for all channels utilization of static PIN as the singular parameter for electronic transactions is increasingly becoming fraud prone,” he said, pointing out that card cloning and PIN closure are apparent to card transaction.

The Genesis Card, he said, unlike its predecessor is made up of three ranges, the prepaid, debit and credit cards are accepted on electronic payment channels such as Automatic Teller Machines (ATM), Point of Sale (POS), web and mobile commerce.

“The card enables the users to determine the authenticity of the transaction via its audit trail. It has two years validity before expiry and for students four years before expiry,” Obi said.

Further, he elucidated that the Genesis cards could also be recharged through the eTranzact Pay Outlet platform as well as be used for other value added schemes such as loyalty scheme and discount scheme.

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Credibility enhances revenue growth – Okere

The Group Managing Director, Computer Warehouse Group (CWG), Mr. Austin Okere, has identified credibility of a company as a means of enhancing its revenue base.

Speaking during an MBA Class talk to the Columbia Business School (CBS) recently,
Okere noted that why CWG decided to go public was to entrench its credibility among stakeholders based on transparent reporting, which in turn would enhance its revenue growth.

Okere shared insights on what informed the decision of the company to go public, was to achieve a deeper culture of transparency through more complete regulatory reporting, and enhance the company’s credibility with stakeholders.

This, he said, enhances revenue growth, provides the opportunity to raise capital for growth and expansion, as well as offer stakeholders a means of achieving stock liquidity at fair value amongst others.

According to Ryan Peterson, one of the anchors of the case development, CBS took the initiative to write case studies on successful entrepreneurial businesses on the continent to dispel the myth that there are no sophisticated businesses on the
African continent or worse still, businesses could only thrive via corruption.

Mr. Peterson also observed that over the past decade, leading African business schools have adopted the traditional case method, but that a majority of the cases being American or European based did not provide much practical learning for the African students or any familiar role model figures that could aspire new investors.

“As it turned out, we couldn’t have picked a better company to lay these stereotypes to rest. The company has thrived in difficult circumstances because of an entrepreneurial culture that embodies the work ethic, personal responsibility and integrity of its founder,” Peterson.

CWG, as said by Peterson, distinguished itself from the competition by consistently delivering on promises to customers and is one of Nigeria’s 50 fastest growing entities.

“A representative from Cisco told us that the firm is ‘probably the most entrepreneurial company in Nigeria, certainly the most entrepreneurial in the Information Technology (IT) sector,’” Peterson added, stressing that the founder of a competing firm, who has since sold his business to a larger international player, expressed similar respect for his former rival at CWG.

Commending Mr. Okere’s presentation to the MBA class at Columbia Business School, Chairman, board of investments, Mauritius, Mr. Maurice Lam Pak Ng, said that it was informative listening to him.

“He is a great example that domestic entrepreneurs can be a success in spite of all the difficulties of doing business in Africa” he declared.

And for the Director, Eugene Lang Entrepreneurial Center at CBS, Prof. Murray Low, Mr. Okere’s presentation, perhaps could be best summarized as overwhelming reception to the case study.

“By the way, I have used the case along with the video in both Tanzania and Kenya for audiences of entrepreneurs, faculty and MBA students. They all find it very inspiring!! It is a real pleasure to have you with us at Columbia,” he said.

ITRealms Online recalled that Mr. Okere has also been invited to give similar talks at the United States International University (USIU) in Nairobi and London Business School in the coming months.

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Glo, Zinox, Phase3 back WAFICT 2010

Globacom has signified its desire to back the West African Information Communications Technology (WAFICT) Congress 2010 as a Platinum sponsor, just as Zinox Technologies, Phase3 Telecom are giving support as bronze sponsor.

ITRealms Online recalls that this is the second year running that Globacom is backing WAFICT as Platinum sponsor.

With this, the high calibre speakers, delegates and guests to the Congress and its sister W.Afri.Tel Exhibition both of which are holding simultaneously from June 1 – 3, 2010 at the ultra-modern Expo Centre of the Eko Hotels and Suites, Lagos, would be treated to the splendour and grand orange green and white colours of the operator.

WAFICT Congress 2010 is organised by Africa’s foremost ICT magazine, IT & Telecom Digest, which is also the sole Nigeria agent for W.Afri.Tel. as earlier announced, the WAFICT Congress 2010 is expected to attract some of the most sophisticated line up of international speakers and participants from across the sub-region and other parts of the world.

WAFICT 2010 is being co-hosted with the London, UK-based Commonwealth Telecommunications Organisation (CTO).

This year’s event, the organizers said, would further strengthened with the collaborative arrangement between IT & Telecom Digest and the Commonwealth Telecommunications Organisation (CTO) and it promises to be a first of its kind three-day discussion and interactive sessions on the theme: Moving West Africa Forward: Policy and Technology Imperatives – Trends, Potentials & Challenges.

Globacom tells a story about the African dream seeing that the company joined the race in Africa’s leading telecom market two years behind the first licensees had begun operations, and determined to make the difference, it launched out with innovative and life changing products and pricing method that has since then altered the face of the telecom industry not only in Nigeria but in the entire Black race; and it continues to sustain this tempo.

And to confirm this pan Africanist vision of its founder, Globacom has since deployed its services into other West African countries and is presently in the Republic of Benin, and has commenced plans to change the face of competition in Cote d’Ivoire.

And this drive is further given impetus with the company’s launch of its Glo 1 submarine cable system which is a first in the world by a private company.

Following on the steps of Globacom are two other Nigerian leading ICT companies and pride of Africa in their own sphere – Zinox Technologies, which is the Gold sponsor and Phase 3 Telecoms as Bronze category sponsor.

Zinox Technologies Limited, Nigeria's IT identity and manufacturers of Nigeria's First Internationally Certified Branded Computers, is presently rated the largest IT group in sub-Saharan African and its computer is rated the second largest selling computer brand in Nigeria according to IDC and is the largest partner for both Intel and Microsoft in Sub Saharan Africa.

Recently, Zinox Computers launched a most robust e-Learning suite in Africa and rated number one by World e-Library with over 750,000 books, the company has been the promoter of Digital Knowledge Democracy Project across Africa, among other pioneering efforts at knowledge promotion.

Zinox recently deployed e -learning suite with 100 laptops and internet facility in each of the select 120 secondary schools in Nigeria in a major national e- project sponsored by the Universal Service Provision Fund, USPF.

On the other hand, Bronze category sponsor and leading provider of transmission and IP services Phase 3 in less than its six years in operation has proven that with a strong vision and passion, a Nigerian company can bring the West Africa sub-region under one umbrella, especially in the development of enduring ICT infrastructure.


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Nwokike reelected WATRA´s executive secretary

The Executive Secretary of the West African Telecommunications Regulators Authority (WATRA), Mr. Nnamdi Nwokike has been re-elected for the second term in the same capacity.

WATRA is the regional assembly for West Africa regulators of Information and Communications Technologies (ICT).

Mr. Nwokike´s latest election took place at the just concluded WATRA Annual General Meeting (AGM), which held in Cotonou, which would see him managing the secretariat of the organisation till 2013.

ITRealms Online recalls that in September 2006, Mr. Nwokike was seconded to WATRA by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) as the acting Executive Secretary and on 28th February 2007, during the Ordinary General Meeting of the organization, he was collectively adopted by the Conference of Regulators as the substantive Executive Secretary of WATRA for a three-year tenure.

Mr. Nwokike has proved since joining NCC in 2001 as a personality with the potential to showcase his multi-task and start up expertise with varied experiences cutting across economic consultancies, marketing and customer relationship management among others.

Before joining NCC, Nwokike has worked with Multiver Systems Limited, the consulting outfit that worked on the setting up of the National Planning Commission, as a Consultant in 1985.

Also, he made inroads into the retailing business with a stint at AG Leventis Group in 1986, from where he joined Seven Up Bottling Co PLC as Marketing Assistant from 1986 to 1987 and made significant contribution in the Fast Moving Consumer Group industry (FMCG).

Between 1987 and 2001, Nwokike worked with Nigerian Breweries Plc, as a District Sales Manager and also as the pioneer Customer Service Training Manager. While in 1996, he was promoted to Area Sales Manager for Lagos State.

Nwokike, who is a 1985 MBA graduate from the University of Nigeria and 1982 BBA in Economics from the University of South-Western Louisiana, USA, joined NCC in 2001, and was tasked to set up the Consumer Affairs Bureau (CAB) as the Head of the unit and in year 2005, he was appointed the Head, Business Development, a position he held until September 2006 when he was seconded to WATRA as acting scribe.


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21st Century, ColourCode Tech enter partnership

The 2010 edition of the Computer, Technology and Office Equipment (CTO) exhibition and conferences ended in Lagos, Friday with the sealing of a partnership deal between 21st Century Technologies and Colour Code Technologies.

Confirming this development, the Chief Executive Officer, 21st Century Technologies Limited, Mr. Wale Ajisebutu described it as a revolutionary.

According to him, the partnership is bringing the new technology which is capable of converting significantly large size of digital data including texts, images, sounds and animations into an eight coloured matrix code.

The encoded materials, he said, could be decoded from the colour patterns of the code through devices as a conventional scanner, web camera, mobile phone or digital camera.

This, he also said, is capable of being applied on paper through a four-colour processed printing machine or an inkjet printer, which provides a unique advantage in jobs that are sensitive with its special application in identification matters.

Additionally, he said, the Colour Code, as often referred to, is ability of embedding a unique identification (ID) inside the code which cannot be decoded by the official decoder as it allows only specific personnel or authorised members to read the code.

¨Similarly as part of its security advantages over existing code systems, this new technology can have a password set inside the code giving it a special function for a specific use of an organisation or group,¨ he said, stressing that the partnership would serve as a big advantage for businesses and state institutions in Nigeria which have been contending with issues of identity management and security of documents as well as individuals, among other things.

He pointed out that given its advancement over existing operations and being a Third Dimension (3D) Code, Colour, the C Code could easily be useful in designs like voice embedded greeting cards, it could be used in determining salient information of origin, manufacturer, manufacturing environment, prescriptions and other details for medicines and foods.

Emphasizing that other agencies like advertisers, educational institutions and audio and other forms of books publishers, and inventory could also be managed using the code and this will lead to significant reduction in time for inventory management, among other advantages.

With its advantage of a maximum capacity per code of 85,019 bytes compared with the QR Code which is a 2D technology with capacity of only 2,953 bytes and the 1D Barcode which can only take 13 digits per a code; Colour C Code automatically leads to a drastic reduction in cost since data can be reproduced in paper. Other advantages are the minimised printing space since digital data like texts can be reduced into Colour Codes and its added security of any information.

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FOSSFA, Digital Commons confab opens in Accra

The fourth conference of the Free and Open Source Foundation for Africa (FOSSFA) and Digital Commons, would today, Monday open at the Advanced Information Technology Institute (AITI) also known as Kofi Annan Centre for Excellent in Information and Communication Technology (ICT), Accra, Ghana.

Chairperson, FOSSFA, Ms Nnenna Nwakanma, made this disclosure weekend at the end of pre-conference workshops organized for some selected media practitioners and stakeholders on the continent on Campware, FOSS business model and Internet Governance policy framework.

According to her, the event would be declared open by the vice president, Republic of Ghana, Mr. John Dramani Mahama and would last till Friday, May 21.

With the theme Development with ownership, she said Idlelo 4 is poised to be the rallying point for ICT experts, exchange, showcasing, innovation, training and projects.

As at the time of filing this report, the exhibition structures are being mounted at the venue.

She also said that the conference would explore the use of open technologies in all domains of African economy, and provide an in-depth assessment of FOSS investments and use in the education sector in Africa.

Specialized tracks, Nwakanma said, would include but not limited to FOSS in governance, business, health, media innovation, civil society, Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and open education resources.

She pointed out that the knowledge creation and sharing event would leverage on the outcomes of the 14th African Summit of Heads of State on ICT for Development of January 2010 to provide a forum for a ministerial round table on e-government practices, policies and trends.

The conference, she said, has planned for a community summit of users, especially women and the youth, and the software developer community, stressing this community forum will allow for an open consultation of global open source engineers, coders, geeks, and community managers with the end users of technology, while integrating user concerns and issues to the broader technological innovations, plans, strategies and trends.

Idlelo is a Southern Africa word that means 'a common grazing ground' with technical hands-on trainings, a community summit, plenaries, panels, workshops, professional examinations, awards, instalfests and high level roundtables.

The first edition (2004) of Idlelo held at the University of Western Cape in South Africa, the second (2006) at the Safari Park Hotel in Nairobi, Kenya and the third (2008) at the Universite Cheikh Anta Diop of Dakar Senegal.

Meanwhile, she said that first-ever African FOSS Reporter Award Competition 2010, unveiled a few months ago would be announced to recognize outstanding reporting for a general audience and honours individuals for their coverage of FOSS.

The competition, she added is run in partnership with Deutsche Welle and supported by Open Source Institute for West Africa (OSIWA) as part of an initiative to raise public awareness on FOSS.

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