The African Development Bank Group (AfDB) and Main One Cable Company have signed a $61 million loan agreement for the financing of a submarine fiber optic cable connection along the West African coast.
According to a statement copied to APA, the system will be based on a trunk-and-branch topology and include branching units to the Canary Islands, Morocco, Senegal and Cote d’Ivoire.
Estimated at $240 million, the project will involve the laying of 7,000-km submarine fiber optic cable between Seixal (a suburb of Lisbon) in Portugal, Accra in Ghana and Lagos in Nigeria.
The system will contribute to an immediate 50 percent drop in the price of bandwidth in Nigeria and Ghana.A continued price reduction is anticipated over time, the statement said.
The considerable increase in available bandwidth from the Main One Cable will provide telecoms operators with the additional capacity they require to expand networks and mobilize a broader range of services.
According to Main One Cable CEO Ms. Funke Opeke, the Main One Cable system will allow accessible and affordable broadband communications in West Africa.
Main One is an African private sector-led initiative aimed at laying 14,000km open access submarine cable to provide international and Internet connectivity to countries between Portugal and South Africa on the West coast of Africa.
Private investors of Nigeria and Ghana as well as institutional investors from the African continent and the world funded it.
Source African Press Agency
