Akwa Ibom Govt Woos Investors, Harps on Digital Technology for National Development

Emma Okonji
The Akwa Ibom State government has called on local and international investors to invest in the state’s broadband technology expansion initiative in order to attain quick return on their investments.

The state has also said it has all it takes to replicate the digital economy initiative of the federal government in the state in order to enhance national development.

Chairman, Akwa Ibom State Committee on Foreign Direct Investment Commission, Gabriel Ukpeh, who spoke during the 3rd Annual Nigeria Tech Summit, which held in Abuja recently, said the state government would leverage on digital technology and innovation to achieve its goal.

“Akwa Ibom is silently leading an economic revolution in Nigeria, leveraging on digital technology,” Ukpeh said.
According to him, Akwa Ibom State has set up several emerging technology and innovation hubs, with a planned Science Park that will enhance Information Technology (IT) in schools, boost educational curriculum that will enable skills development and job creation.

The Nigeria Tech Summit is a yearly event hosted by the Global Startup Ecosystem in partnerships with US Embassy of Abuja, Google Cloud, AWS, IBM Cloud, Hubspot, Sendgrid, among others. The summit boasts of an active network of Nigeria’s investors, tech entrepreneurs, celebrities, politicians and business moguls. Each year, it gathers thousands of industry players from across Nigeria and around the world to address the challenges that affect Nigeria’s technology future.

Speakers at this year’s summit include United States Ambassador to Nigeria, Ambassador Mary Beth Leonard; Director, Diaspora Affairs at the Office of the President, Akwasi Awua Ababio; CEO at Global Startup Ecosystem, Christine Ntim and a host of others.

Speaking about how technology has helped states that are leveraging technology to drive economic development, Ukpeh said: “The experience of COVID 19 has made it mandatory for states like Akwa Ibom to move all government activities online with the support of a robust internet connectivity system, which the state has put in place, while encouraging online meetings. A good example is this programme. The number of online participants, far outnumbered those with physical attendance. The backbone to this is broadband connectivity.

With the recent auctioning of the 3.5GHz spectrum for 5G technology deployment by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), Nigerians should expect more of online communications and transactions, since 5G will increase the speed of internet connectivity and downloads.”