IPV6 Council Nigeria has inaugurated its Communications and Advocacy Committee (CAC) as part of efforts to ensure that Nigerian networks migrate to the internet protocol in good time.

Inaugurating the committee on Monday in Lagos, Muhammed Rudman, Chairman, IPv6 Council Nigeria, decried the low level of IPv6 ready networks as well as usage in Nigeria even as the country occupies first and seventh positions in internet usage in Africa and the world respectively.

“We don’t want Nigeria to be left behind in the migration to IPv6, this is why we need to step up the awareness and advocacy campaign to ensure that ISPs, telecommunications operators, Banks, educational institutions among others migrate to IPv6,” he said.

Rudman attributed the low level of uptake of IPv6 in the country to lack of technical know-how, core equipment compatibility issues, lack of IPv6 upstream service providers in the country and non-requests from end users among others.

He stated that for the use of IPv6 to grow in the country, there should be IPv6 awareness and capacity building through organising seminars and trainings, incorporating IPv6 into university curriculum.

He stressed the need to provide some profit incentives to Internet Industry to encourage them to adopt IPv6 based Infrastructure. “These incentives could include reduction in regulatory fee and tax rebates,” he said.

Remmy Nweke, Chairman, Communications and Advocacy Committee of the Council, said that some Nigerians are very tired of hearing the country leapfrogging to catch up with the rest of the world, even in Africa, following the clear depletion of IPv4, which makes advocacy pertinent.

Nweke said: “When the IPv6 Council Nigeria was given birth to after series of discussions, especially with the global IPv6 Forum led by a longtime friend, Mr. Latif Ladid, I had no doubt we are making progress but slowly.

“For those who have seen to this day, I must say it’s a new dawn, especially those of us coming from the communication and advocacy background to up our games and wear our IPv6 swimming suits by way of embracing the 21st century IP concept, which is IPv6 so as to learn and impact our generation as we move along.

“I wish to assure that this committee will do everything possible to promote Internet Protocol version Six (IPv6) in Nigeria and in the sub region as well as the continent and world at large.”

Other members of the committee include Bayero Agabi, Chike Onwuegbuchi, Nahimah Nurudeen and Martin Ekpeke.

The Communications and Advocacy Committee of IPv6 Council Nigeria is to assist the Board of the council in effectively overseeing the IPv6 Councils’ communications and advocacy strategy and policies, public and stakeholder engagement that will facilitate the adoption and usage of IPv6 addresses in Nigeria by internet service providers, telcos, higher educational institutions and other IP centric organisations.

•Photo shows, L-R; Member, Communication and Advocacy Committee, IPV6 Council Nigeria, Mr. Martins Ekpeke; Secretary, Mrs. Nahimah Nurudeen; Chairman, IPV6 Council Nigeria, Mr. Muhammed Rudman; Chairman of the Committee, Mr. Remmy Nweke and Member, Mr. Chike Onwuegbuchi, during the inauguration of Communication and Advocacy Committee (CAC) of IPV6 Council Nigeria, in Lagos.

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