The ECOWAS Parliament has called for the instant implementation of the Regulation on Roaming on Public Mobile Communications Networks in the ECOWAS space to crash the outrageous costs of cell networks on trans-border communication in the West African sub-region
It additionally noted that ECOWAS can best gain regional improvement through ensuring that the Regulation on Roaming on Public Mobile Communications Networks in the ECOWAS Space, which was adopted through the Council of Ministers on sixteenth December 2017 is implemented.
Speaker of Ghanaian Parliament, Rt Hon Alban Bagbin made this call whilst affirming open the delocalized assembly of ECOWAS Joint Committee on Political Affairs, Peace, Security and Africa Peer Review Mechanism (APRM), Legal Affairs and Human Rights, and Telecommunications and Information Technology.
This law he stated is meant to lessen costs paid by ECOWAS citizens for communication services whilst roaming in the community.
“According to the World Bank report 2018, there are over 320 million mobile subscribers within the Sub-region. However, the uptake of cellular statistics in the sub-region stays a severe challenge.
It is a reality that most of the ECOWAS nationals who journey to different nations in the sub-region need to pay higher charges on cellular usage, whilst others have to alternate their sim cards to have get entry to to the network available in their new destination,” he in addition explained.
He added that it is no gainsaying that telecommunications and information technology is rapid turning into a driving force in today’s digital atmosphere through seamlessly connecting communities, businesses, and governments.
He explained that, “It is consequently more vital now than ever to deploy the use of telecommunications and information technology to enhance all sectors of one’s economic system and additionally promote the improvement of the sub-region.
Technology and ICT are certainly very beneficial and crucial in propelling our sub-region forward, whether or not in the area of peace, development, education, health delivery, agriculture, etc. We must however bear in mind that whilst technology is extremely good for development, the human touch cannot be replicated.
Thus, whilst we strive to inject a lot extra technology and ICT into our approaches, we should bear in mind the quote by Lyndon B. Johnson, Former President of the United States of America, which reads “If future generations are to remember us more with gratitude than sorrow, we have to achieve extra than just the miracles of technology.
We need to additionally leave them with a glimpse of the world as it was created, now no longer simply as it seemed whilst we got through with it”.
He concluded that the subject for the meeting, is “the Role of Telecommunications and Information Technology (TIT) in Achieving Regional Development, Peace and Security and Human Rights’’.
