I occasionally, as i ponder upon my long-term career path, crave an idea of following a direct professional career in government, South Africa specifically and Africa generally. So, i do yearn to become a bureacrat. Yeah, right! Surely, i would'nt entertain this thought if i had no value in mind
to add and contribute to the bureacratic system. The thought is provoked by somehow the generally apparent lack of a duty to serve with a servant heart by bureacrats and their masters. There's an old saying that goes like "a fish rods from the head". I wouldnt blame bureacrats that much, but more the masters, which largely tend to be the political heads delegating their power to the bureacrats. The latter then becomes a source of my reluctance to pursue a career in government and my ambitions get squashed before i begin to lay the path. So, i will remain a good citizen and active civil member of society, for now. What triggered my thoughts about the bureaucrats' perfomance is the lost opportunity by African nations to create and develop a vibrant and dynamic advanced technologies and building electronic manufacturing hubs throughout the continent spawned by the switchover of analogue brodcasting signal to digital.
In just less than three years, all signatory member states of the International Telecommunications Union (ITU) are to lose the protection of their analogue broadcasting signal which will be phased out by December 31, 2015. Terrestrial analogue transmission, is an old transmission technology which has become expensive to maintain and lagging behind new transmission technologies. Many current television sets are not capable to receive terrestrial digital transmissions and as such will not operate after December 2015. These television sets do not have a digital tuner capable to convert analogue transmission signal to digital. Discerning consumers in Africa will be able to purchase alternative television sets or afford the decoders (set-top-boxes). But what about the poor consumers?
While other continents (Europe, Asia and US) have been running on digital brodcasting signals since mid 90's and currently upgrading and fully testing the signals, Africa has lost yet another opportunity that could have been a driver of economic growth through electronic manufacturing sectors of set-top-boxes (terrestrial digital decoders). This once again points to the loopholes of economic policies and lack of decision-making by bureaucrats aligned to the growth of society through developing business sectors opportune to deliver the goal. With the well-oiled bureaucratic machinery, switch-over projects by ITU member states in Sub-Saharan Africa could have been the first of the economic projects to set the tone towards the building of the "COMESA-EAC-SADC Tripartite Alliance.
Poor policy decision-making, myopic planning, incorrect policy fundamentals on the role of government in the economy and fragmented coordination led to unnecessary delays of launching such a significant development in the broadcasting sector well on time. The Africa Digital Switchover Summit held in January 2011 remained a talk shop as African countries continued to deploy respective disintegrated programmes that are not contributing to the set objectives.
Given its own challenges as experienced in countries that deployed digital transmissions, three years to the deadline only means a push for compliance and not to the benefit of the economies. At the same time, technology and electronic multinationals, Apple and Samsung, just to mention two, are already planning to bring television sets with digital tuners to the market. This indeed, cements the argument of a long-term opportunity lost.
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