Luanda – Angolan minister of Telecommunications Information Technologies and Social Communication Mário Augusto Oliveira Friday reiterated the intention of the Angolan authorities "to transform the country into a telecommunications hub".
The move is intended to ensure the implementation of one of the postulates of the White Paper on Telecommunications and Information Technologies.
In order to achieve this goal, he added, given the geographical coverage of the Angosat-2 satellite, Angola has initiated contacts with countries in the region.
This is to ensure the marketing of the satellite's services among entities and zone-based companies.
The minister was delivering his speech at the inauguration ceremony of Satellite Control and Mission Centre, chaired by the Head of State João Lourenço, in the Funda area, in Luanda province, underlining that taking into account of the role of Satellite 2, this hub will certainly be achieved.
Mário Oliveira noted that it is possible, from the infrastructure inaugurated today, to follow up, control and monitor three satellites simultaneously, as the Angosat-2 project foresees the launch of other satellites for different purposes.
The official explained that the work currently done at the center includes operation planning tasks, monitoring the functioning of the subsystems, ballistic maneuvers, aimed at maintaining the satellite in its orbital position.
Such tasks are carried out and managed to 100% by young staff.
“One of the biggest challenges for our sector is to work to improve the penetration rate of telecommunications services so that they reach all citizens with quality and affordable prices, regardless of their geographic location”, he stressed.
The official said that in terms of mobile communications, the department's goals are to increase the coverage of the 3G network from the current 73% to above 90%, from 4G from the current 22% to 40%, the expansion of the 5G network to the country's main cities, as well as raising the number of internet subscribers, per 100 inhabitants, from 28% to 77%.
He maintained that this ambition is only possible to be achieved with the use of a robust support communications infrastructure that covers the entire national territory, combining transmission systems via terrestrial and maritime fiber optics, microwave systems via radio and via satellite, including transmission via Angosat-2 and the project for a national fiber optic broadband network.
Free Wireless TV
He referred to the digital migration programme for television that will be one of the beneficiaries of Angosat-2 services and that will constitute a total change in the TV paradigm, in which the national television channels will be received in open signal with the required quality and with other benefits, such as alert systems for natural catastrophes, internet, among other services.
