Nigeria has been re-elected into the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) Council, a United Nations specialized agency that oversees global telecommunication operations, in recognition of the country’s critical roles on the global telecom stage.
Nigeria will serve on the Council again from 2023-2026.
Nigeria and other countries’ election for a four-year term on Monday into different regional groups that constitute ITU Council, was the highpoint of the Plenipotentiary Conference 2022 (PP-22) ongoing in Bucharest, the capital of the Republic of Romania.
The Nigerian delegation to the forum was led by the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Prof. Isa Ali Ibrahim Pantami. Other members of the delegation include the Chairman, Board of Commissioners of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), Prof. Adeolu Akande, and the Executive Vice Chairman/Chief Executive Officer of NCC, Prof. Umar Danbatta.
Speaking on Nigeria’s re-election into the ITU Council, the NCC’s Executive Vice Chairman thanked the ITU member states for the confidence they had in Nigeria as expressed with the re-election of the country into the ITU Council.
The EVC enthused: “The re-election of Nigeria as a member of ITU Council for the next four years, again, points to the globally-recognised leadership role Nigeria is playing in Africa and at the level of ITU Council in the area of telecommunications policy formulation and technical regulations development to drive ITU’s mission and vision.”
The seats in ITU Council are divided into five regions A to E and Nigeria was elected into the ITU Council, Region D for Africa, which has 13 seats. Other 12 countries elected alongside Nigeria are Algeria; Egypt; Ghana; Kenya; Mauritius; Morocco; Rwanda; Senegal; South Africa; Tanzania; Tunisia; and Uganda.
At the conference, which started on September 26th and is scheduled to end on October 14th, member states voted on the composition of the next ITU Council and the 12 representatives to serve on the Radio Regulations Board (RRB) for the next four years.
The 21st Plenipotentiary Conference of the Council also saw the election by member states, of Doreen Bogdan-Martin of the United States of America as the organisation’s next Secretary-General.
Bogdan-Martin, the first woman to lead ITU in its 157-year history, will begin her four-year tenure from January 2023, when Houlin Zhao would have completed his second final term as ITU Secretary General.
The ITU, originally established in 1865 as the International Telegraph Union and became a United Nations specialized agency in 1947, was set up to coordinate telecommunications operations and services throughout the world. It is headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland.
Nigeria became a member of ITU on November 4, 1961. The USA joined on July 1, 1908; United Kingdom, February 24, 1871, and UAE on June 27, 1972.
The ITU is governed by the Plenipotentiary Conference and the Administrative Council. The Plenipotentiary Conference is the supreme organ of the Union. It is the decision-making body which determines the direction of the Union and its activities.
