The Minister for Communications Technology, Mrs. Omobola Johnson has expressed satisfaction with the activities of the Nigerian Communications Satellite (NIGCOMSAT) Limited saying that NIGCOMSAT products must leave the research centre and move to the market to impact positively on the lives of Nigerians.

The Minister stated this when she paid a visit to the Ground Control Station of the Company at the Obasanjo Space Centre along Umaru Musa Yar’adua Express Way, in Abuja recently.

‘I think we need to get out there, create awareness about what has been done, that is the way to go about it. It is not government but you going into the marketplace telling them what have been done and how it can affect their business and their lives’, she said.

Explaining further, Mrs. Johnson said ‘l have known about NIGCOMSAT for many years and l wasn’t aware that they have these labs here and are creating these wonderful products, l think it is about creating awareness, getting these brilliant engineers here to showcase what they have done because these are things that are not useful in the labs, these are things that are meant for people to use’.

Expressing reservation on the Public Private Partnership on the products, the Minister explained that she was talking about designing a product and selling that product to the market that needs it. ‘It just happened that NIGCOMSAT is being funded by Federal Government but it could have been any research agency funded by grants from anywhere in the world’.

She therefore said that her plans for NIGCOMSAT are to see how to get these products out for Nigerians to use.

Earlier in an interview with the press shortly after taking the Minister round the complex, the Managing Director of NIGCOMSAT Ltd, Engr. Timasaniyu Ahmed-Rufai said the Company has been looking at marketing the products to the general public and it has been looking at the angle of a Public Private Partnership. ‘We are going to work with the industry partners, small and medium scale, big time ICT service providers, sell the products to them,’ Engr. Rufai said.

He stated that NIGCOMSAT is thinking of convening a stakeholders meeting to present the products formally to them and also to engage in direct marketing targeted at relevant partners.