Mandela's passion for Telecoms growth in Africa

Today, the world celebrates late Nelson Mandela for his political struggle and achievements in bringing peace to South Africa and the rest of the world. Yes, it is worthy to remember him for his political struggles, but there is also need to remember him for his passion and contributions to telecoms development in Africa, and this could be best captured from his speech at the opening ceremony of Telecom 95, the 7th World Telecommunications Forum and Exhibition in Geneva, on October 3, 1995.

The Value of Telecommunications
According to Mandela at the opening ceremony of the Telecom 95, "As prisoners on Robben Island, when we were deprived of newspapers we searched the refuse bins for the discarded sheets of newspapers which warders had used to wrap their sandwiches. We communicated with prisoners in other sections by gathering matchboxes thrown away by warders, concealing messages in false bottoms in the boxes and leaving them for other prisoners to find. We communicated with the outside world by smuggling messages in the clothing of released prisoners. Not even the most repressive regime can stop human beings from finding ways of communicating and obtaining access to information."

This, he said, applied in equal measure to the information revolution sweeping the globe. No one can roll it back. It has the potential to open communications across all geographical and cultural divides.

Nevertheless, one gulf will not be easily bridged - that is the division between the information rich and the information poor. Justice and equity demand that we find ways of overcoming it. If more than half the world is denied access to the means of communication, the people of developing countries will not be fully part of the modern world. For in the 21st century, the capacity to communicate will almost certainly be a key human right, he said.

He added that eliminating the distinction between information rich and information poor countries was also critical to eliminating economic and other inequalities between North and South, and to improving the quality of life of all humanity.

Bridging Communications Gap
Converging developments in the fields of information and communications offer immense potential to make real progress in this direction. The pace at which the price of communications and information systems has fallen has also undermined the previously rigid link between a nation's wealth and its information richness. There is an unprecedented window of opportunity.

But the present reality is that the technology gap between the developed and developing nations is actually widening. Most of the world has no experience of what readily accessible communications can do for society and economy, Mandela said in his speech.

According to him, given the fundamental impact of telecommunications on society and the immense historical imbalances, telecommunications issues must become part of general public debate on development policies. Telecommunications cannot be simply treated as one commercial sector of the economy, to be left to the forces of the free market.

source: www.thisdaylive.com