President William Ruto presents a copy of the Ministerial Performance Contracts for FY 2023/2024 signed by the Ministry of Information, Communications and the Digital Economy Eliud Owalo at State House on August 1, 2023. PHOTO | FRANCIS NDERITU | NMG
The government’s plan to roll out 25,000 Internet hubs countrywide is laudable. However, a recent report that Wi-Fi spots in Nairobi have ground to a halt does not inspire confidence that the roll-out will be without hitches on a larger scale.
The authorities involved in the project should go back to the drawing board and address the teething problems based on the lessons from the glitch that has hit the initiative in the capital city.
Failing on a larger magnitude should the programme be implemented as planned might result in the loss of taxpayer funds.
The false start in Nairobi, which arguably has the best Internet infrastructure compared with the remote parts of the country, is telling. What would be the case for regions with poorer infrastructure?
The ICT ministry and State agencies involved with the project should address the outages in Nairobi and only roll out in the rest of the country after solving the bottlenecks identified.
Poor planning should not be allowed to come in the way of the initiative, which the government has been touting as a strategy to boost e-commerce and help in the creation of jobs.
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