Former Executive Vice Chairman (EVC) of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) Dr Ernest Ndukwe has disclosed that a revitalised and repositioned NCC under his watch was central to the quantum leap achieved in the telecommunications sector between 2000 and 2010 .
The huge leap transformed the then lethargic sector of less than five hundred thousand largely epileptic lines to tens of million GSM lines and has come to be known as Nigeria’s telecommunications revolution.
Speaking during an interview conducted by One2One  and broadcast on Channels Television last night, Ndukwe disclosed that on his assumption of office as the EVC of NCC in year 2000, he quickly audited the available manpower and came to the realisation that an empowered and highly skilled staff will be needed to help translate his transformative agenda to reality.
To achieve this, he  ensured the enlargement of the lean workforce he met  by carefully recruiting highly skilled personnel from both the private and public sectors.
He also obtained permission to introduce  an enhanced salary structure outside of the normal civil service, which not only motivated the work force but also ensured talent retention.Also,broadbased and specialist local and overseas capacity enhancement trainings were instituted for optimum efficiency.
Ndukwe credited the board of NCC under the Chairmanship of the venerable Alhaji Ahmed Joda for giving the executive management the latitude to operate without let or hindrance .
Ndukwe also commended the nation’s political leadership at the time headed by then President Olusegun Obasanjo for its commitment to  a new order in the nation’s telecommunications sector.He revealed that a last-minute attempt to derail the historic 2001 Dutch option that ushered new entrants like MTN and Econet (the forerunner of Airtel) was nipped in the bud by the decisive intervention of former Vice President Atiku Abubakar.
Casting a retrospective glance at his time at NCC Ndukwe,hitherto a key industry private sector player,stated that public service provided him a larger platform to render impactful national service.
A seasoned engineer, Ndukwe is currently the chairman of MTN Nigeria.
