The last time I checked, Nigeria as a country was still in the process of attaining a complete Digital Switch-Over (DSO) in her broadcasting sector across the federation.
It could be recalled that on 29th April 2021, the Federal Government (FG) of Nigeria led by the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed launched the long-awaited DSO in the city of Lagos.
The event marked the beginning of the second phase of the rollout of the DSO across the federation. It could be recalled that the first phase respectively held in Jos, Abuja, Ilorin, Kaduna, Enugu and Osogho-Ajala, between April 2016 and February 2018.
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During the launch of the DSO whose brand name was given as FreeTV, the minister said “This may look like a daunting task. Indeed, it is. But the fact that we are here in Lagos today is a testimony to our resilience and determination to ensure the success of the transition from analog to digital television across the country”.
Let’s be notified that the DSO offers the teeming viewers about 60 digital channels, including sports, music, movies and news. It also provides Value Added Services (VAS).
It’s noteworthy that the campaign regarding global migration from analogue to digital broadcasting precisely commenced on June 17, 2006, hence about fifteen years back.
In respect of the quest, the Nigerian government graciously signed a regional and international agreement to conclude the digital migration by June 17, 2012, which was then the stipulated deadline.
In a bid to meet up the deadline, in 2008, the FG set up a Presidential Advisory Committee (PAC). The following year, the committee submitted its report but the FG ostensibly failed to implement it, causing Nigeria to miss the June 2012 deadline. The migration deadline was however shifted to June 17, 2015.
Though the ‘Digi-team’ inaugurated by the FG alongside the National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) made a frantic effort to fulfill the mandate, the efforts again didn’t yield any result owing to paucity of funds as was reported.
Thereafter, June 17, 2017 was recognized as the new deadline for the lingered transition. In spite of all the efforts put in place by the NBC to actualize the feat, yet the motive wasn’t realized.
Nigerians were thereafter promised that June 2019 wouldn’t pass them by as regards the DSO. Painfully, the target was missed four consecutive times, thereby making countless concerned Nigerians to apparently lose hope.
It therefore became obvious that some technical and political policies cum measures were yet to be inculcated into the approach being carried out by the relevant authorities.
Hence, the launch of the DSO in Ikeja, Lagos State in April this year was seemingly an indication that the FG politically and technically prepared to eventually actualize the much lingered feat. However, for the needed goal to be holistically achieved, the concerned bodies must comprehend the inevitable role of digital broadcasting.
Analogue mode of transmission is an unreliable system, though it has worked well enough for over half a century. Analogue Television (TV) transmits programming in a continuous signal.
The signal varies in amplitude, depending on the information contained in the audio or picture. It is transmitted on a particular radio frequency from the TV station’s transmitting antenna over the air, to the viewer’s TV set.
It’s noteworthy that each TV station is assigned a particular frequency that corresponds to its channel number. So, when a viewer tunes his/her TV to a given channel, he/she has actually chosen to receive transmissions on that certain frequency.
TV frequencies are calibrated in Megahertz (MHz). There are two major transmission frequency bands, namely: Very High Frequency (VHF) and Ultra High Frequency (UHF). VHF channels 2 to 6 operate in the frequency range between 54 and 88MHz. VHF channels 7 to 13 operate in the frequency range between 174 and 216MHz. And UHF channels 14 to 83 operate in the frequency range between 470 and 890MHz.
The aforementioned analog signal is far from perfect. It does not usually reproduce the exact original programming. It can easily deteriorate over long distances. It can equally suffer interference from other sources, thereby producing ghost images, static, and ‘snow’.
Hence, analog transmissions typically produce a lower-quality visual output than the original. The picture is not quite as sharp; the background is sometimes grainy. And the sound suffers from noise and reduced frequency response.
A situation where the viewer tries to receive a signal from a distant station is even more unbearable. The farther the station, the worse the picture, likewise the sound. The results are also poor if the viewer is located in a big city with lots of buildings that bounce the signal around. Among all, analogue transmission is inefficient; each VHF or UHF channel takes up a lot of valuable bandwidth.
Unlike analogue transmission that is prone to fading, digital technology reproduces a reliable crystal-clear picture without any form of interference. Digital tech equally enables TV stations to broadcast multiple channels with different programming. It can fit four or more channels into a single analogue channel; hence, it can accommodate as many wavebands as possible within the existing spectrum.
Digital tech makes the work easier, improves the professionalism, viewers’ delight, boosts capacity of the broadcasting industry, and creates more job opportunities as well as uplifts income (revenue) for both the broadcasters and the governments. Above all, it would enable more prospective broadcasting firms in Nigeria to be licensed by the NBC.
To this end, Nigeria needs to hasten up towards meeting up with her sister countries that have already completely keyed into the trend. Launching the DSO is a way-forward, but practical actions must be inculcated in the ongoing mantra towards complete actualization of the motive.
Digital Terrestrial Multimedia Broadcasting (DTMB), to be utilized by Nigeria, adopts time-domain synchronous Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiplexing (OFDM) modulation technology, with a pseudo-random signal frame to serve as the Guard Interval (GI) of the OFDM block and the training symbol. Its content is viable and reliable, thus worthy of emulation.
In the event held in Lagos, Alhaji Lai stated that the launch of the DSO showed the power and the extensive reach of modern broadcasting, which makes it a veritable tool for national development.
According to the boss, there were over one million Set-Top-Boxes ready to be released to households. A Set-Top-Box is a device that enables a TV set to receive band decode digital broadcasts.
The minister further hinted “Once a TV household acquires the Set-Top-Box and pays the once-a-year access fee, which is a token, it is free viewing all the way. Our FreeTV brand is not a fluke. There is no monthly subscription payment”.
The Broadcasting Organization of Nigeria (BON) has a very vital role to play in a bid to achieve this lofty objective of the FG. They must acknowledge what they stand to gain in the long run.
Broadcasting involves generation, transmission and distribution of signals. It’s the duty of the various broadcasting stations to provide the required equipment for the first two phases such as computers, amplifiers and solid-state digital transmitters. The government, on its part, is to provide the instruments for the distribution phase such as ITS and pinnacle.
BON must, therefore, conscientize their teeming members to do the needful. They ought to equally ensure that the radio broadcasting section joins the campaign for the sake of thoroughness as regards digital broadcasting within the shores of Nigeria.
Towards sustaining the feat, if actualized, the FG needs to create stiff policies and regulations. The NBC would be expected to be more proactive and endeavour to create the needed awareness.
Similarly, the broadcasting firms need to deploy standard maintenance and anti-hacking softwares as well as engage reliable tech experts in their daily activities, either as consultants or employees.
The overall project is capital-intensive, so there’s a need for adequate collaboration both on the part of the government and the investors.