Dodoma: The Making of the Broadband City?

Life is pain, so said the Hindu’s holy scripts the Bhagavad Gita. So, at least to the Hindus, the whole purpose of living is to manage pain. However, sometimes, life can be painfully funny – for a moment giving us a reprieve through the little amusements it produces. It is like the gods are encouraging us to keep on participating in their sadistic experiments!

That was the kind of feeling I got when I heard the PM, Mr. Kassim Majaliwa, issuing a directive for government institutions shifting to Dodoma to go paperless in their operations by saying: ‘Dodoma will be an electronic capital’. If the PM was going for the vaguest articulation for the city’s digital technology vision, or a smarter Dodoma, he could not have done better. The problem is the statement showed little comprehension of what he wished to communicate and how it was going to be achieved, a very good reason why it will most probably not be achieved. However, one ought to appreciate the sentiment behind that statement – the idea is quite commendable. In this article our goal is to show how the whole of Dodoma – and not only government’s institutions – can actually go digital.

Loosely speaking digital technology is founded on three pillars: communication infrastructure such as telecom and computer networks; applications such as accounting, ticketing, taxation and business registration systems; and a myriad of sensors and devices that provide inputs from various sources which are to be managed. In today’s world when one thinks of these things one should think of broadband.

Think Superfast Broadband

Broadband has been likened as a ‘nervous system of today’s civilization’, a top priority if the government is to achieve digital transformation in Dodoma, or any other city for that matter. And if one would think of broadband access one should think of fiber connectivity. As important as that message is Africa has been unfortunate enough to be flooded with so much mobile internet noise that we forget that the only reason we went the mobile way first was out of necessity rather than design.

This is the story: when mobile voice services were being deployed in Africa in the mid 1990s subscriptions to fixed line services were very low thus highlighting the gap that existed between the investments that others had already made in their infrastructures compared to us. For example, in 1995, for every 1000 people the number of fixed line subscribers in Tanzania, Sub Saharan Africa and OECD nations was 3, 11 and 450 respectively. And, considering that CAPEX per subscriber was much higher for fixed line subscribers compared to mobile subscribers, mobile voice became a substitute for fixed voice – rather than a complement – and it proved to be astonishingly popular here.

However, given that it is data demand rather than voice’s that drives infrastructure investments now, and given that that demand has far outpaced investments, this exposes the fallacies of our reliance on mobile technology to meet our data needs. Besides, fixed line CAPEX per subscriber is falling faster and may eventually catch up with mobile equivalent (e.g. when the mobile CAPEX per subscriber in the region was said to be around $180, an FTTH service provider in Kenya managed to connect thousands of subscribers at $230 each.) The bottom line is even 5G with its vastly superior data capacities it will not eliminate the need for fiber connectivity. Fiber is simply irreplaceable and one cannot have more of it.

Thus, the sooner we end our infatuation with mobile technology and start to implement appropriate fiber deployment strategies the faster we can achieve a true digital transformation. The multiplier effects of fiber-based broadband are just too great to ignore. So, our misguided priorities aside, we will have to marshal our strategic capabilities to capitalise on the many opportunities which are currently going to waste needlessly.

What are these opportunities? The biggest of them all is the fact that Dodoma is a relatively new city that will be built from the ground. That is, new constructions and civil works projects all around. And this is a broadband strategist’s goldmine: a never miss opportunity.

Deploy Fiber. Now.

Research shows – and many papers have been published on the subject – that at least two thirds of the total cost of fiber investments is made up of civil works: digging, repaving, overlaying conduits, etc. Given all the construction work that will be done in Dodoma, if one were to ensure that with each of these activities a provision is made for broadband infrastructure, effectively making broadband ready buildings (BRB) and broadband ready city (BRC), then the future costs of fiber projects can be collapsed to the remaining one third – for equipments, cables, etc.

What will be the cost implication of doing this? Well, according to one man, probably the only other Tanzanian whose vision and passion for broadband I truly respect, for every 1km of tarmac road built, the cost will be 2% of the budget of that. I feel that that figure is on the higher side, but the point is made.

To achieve the smart Dodoma vision the very first thing we ought to do is make the city and the buildings within broadband ready. And this must be done now, five years later will be too late.

What does this mean? Ideally one would want to see a fiber manhole or POP as close as possible to every residence, multi-tenant unit or office building. This will make it easy for operators to complete the last mile in the most competitive ways possible. This way we can start dreaming of superfast broadband in our own homes. It is possible.

Policy Implications

What are the policy implications? We only need a directive – or law – requiring that any public and private infrastructure work – roads, railways, power, water, sewage, etc. – should include a component where plastic fiber conduits will be buried and manholes built; that these conduits will accommodate multiple broadband services providers and that no individual right of way will be allowed henceforth.

So, does the PM want Dodoma to be ‘an electronic capital’? Now he cannot say he doesn’t know where to start. This will be one of the most commonsensical decisions ever taken in this country: its financial and economic impact will be compounded for generations to come.

But commonsense is not a very common sense. So, despite our well meant efforts here and elsewhere, Tanzanians will most probably continue to suffer – the debilitating internet charges from mobile operators, the fools’ errands resulting from non-integrated government systems, massive expenses from poorly planned afterthought ‘ICT’ projects – even though we have been given the means to relieve that pain.

The African gods have a very weird sense of humour!

NB: Readers might be interested to watch this interesting TEDx talk entitled: Fiber Builds Strong Cities by the mayor of the first city to deploy gigabit fiber in the US.

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