(NCC. Photo Credit: Nigeria Stories)
The Nigerian Communications Commission has urged young inventors to provide scalable and reasonably priced technological solutions that might remove obstacles that keep underprivileged Nigerians and people with disabilities from fully engaging in the digital economy.
Rimini Makama, the NCC’s Executive Commissioner for Stakeholder Management, made the announcement on Wednesday during the launch of the fourth NCC Hackathon Live Show in Abuja, which had the theme “Technology Without Barriers.”
According to Makama, who was represented by Usman Malah, the NCC Director of Zonal Operations, people with disabilities still encounter barriers when trying to access government platforms, employment opportunities, healthcare, education, financial services, and communication services.
Rather than sophisticated items that remained unavailable to those who needed them, she claimed that the difficulties required innovations built around the realities of Nigerians.
“Don’t only concentrate on creating amazing technologies.
Makama advised participants to concentrate on developing solutions that are easy to use, inexpensive to implement, scalable across communities, and capable of raising the standard of living for millions of Nigerians.
Beginning on Wednesday and ending on Thursday, the two-day event unites young innovators to create solutions in the areas of assistive technologies, voice-enabled communication, sign language recognition, accessible digital services, inclusive employment platforms, and artificial intelligence.
The commission stated that the initiative’s goal was to create workable and scalable solutions to issues related to digital inclusion and technology access, especially those that impact underprivileged groups and people with disabilities.
According to Makama, the hackathon showed the commission’s dedication to making sure that technology progress resulted in increased economic engagement.
According to her, “the true measure of technological advancement lies not only in the sophistication of our innovations, but in the extent to which they improve lives, expand opportunities, and empower every member of society to participate meaningfully in the digital economy.”
Speaking at the event, the Director of the Digital Economy Department at the NCC, Helen Obi, said the programme was designed to promote homegrown solutions for persons with disabilities and Nigerians in rural areas who had been excluded from parts of the digital economy.
According to her, the panel was especially interested in technologies that could get over obstacles related to location, income, language, literacy, and handicap.
Participants are supposed to investigate low-bandwidth, offline-first systems that can function in remote locations without requiring internet connectivity or advanced hardware, she said.
“We are developing a low bandwidth, offline-first digital service solution that is appropriate for remote rural operations,” Obi stated.
AI-powered speech-to-text and real-time sign-language translation, voice-enabled systems, accessible USSD services for non-smartphones, image-to-voice navigation, and inclusive job-matching platforms for people with impairments are among the key areas, according to her list.
Twenty solutions were expected to be presented during the first day of the hackathon, covering accessibility challenges in healthcare, education, emergency communications, electricity services, employment and digital commerce.
Among them were ADITUS, which proposes USSD and SMS access to the NCC’s 112 emergency service for people unable to make voice calls; ClearSignal, designed to provide accessible electricity outage alerts to blind, visually impaired and deaf users; and SignBridge AI, which seeks to improve communication between deaf patients and healthcare providers.
Other entries included E-Novate, an AI-powered application designed to translate Nigerian Sign Language into spoken and written English in hospitals; Sora, an inclusive job-matching platform for persons with disabilities; and Kasuwa, which proposes allowing Nigerians to start and operate online businesses through phone calls without smartphones, data or screens.
Obi said entries would be assessed on criteria including innovation, accessibility, relevance, technical feasibility, scalability, affordability, sustainability and indigenous value addition.
The commission said promising solutions could subsequently receive support for further development, pilot deployment and expansion.
The hackathon continues on Thursday with the five finalists expected to pitch their solutions before the judges, followed by the presentation of certificates and cash prizes to winners and participants.
