Chris Wood, the CEO of the West Indian Ocean Cable Company (WIOCC), has dispelled rumors that have been circulating in the wake of the recent widespread internet outages in Nigeria and other African nations caused by an underwater cable cut.
A few weeks ago, there were widespread complaints because millions of individuals were unable to use the internet, which had an impact on numerous commercial operations.
Regarding the status of the broken cables that resulted in major disruptions to internet operations, several theories have been put forth in the media.
According to one of these views, the wires might never be fixed because they have outlived their anticipated lifespan and were probably severed as a result.
Chris Wood, however, denied these rumors in a statement released on Tuesday, emphasizing that none of the four impacted cables had reached the end of their useful lives.
According to Wood, cable cuts occur frequently all around the world and are frequently brought on by things like a ship’s anchor, underwater landslides, seismic activity like earthquakes, and other incidences of a similar nature.
In addition, he revealed that repairs are presently in progress, but he did not offer any precise information about when they will be finished or how much they will cost.
“There’s very limited capability to restore those networks at this time because there isn’t the same level of network diversity. We’re working with our partners to land Equiano in Ghana, and we’re working with the government and regulator there to acquire the correct licenses and everything to bring Equiano into Ghana, hopefully, that will be done as fast as possible, and any future events like this will have a smaller impact.
“And in terms of the impact on other countries, there are different levels of impact felt by different countries. Equiano lands in Nigeria, so there are restoration opportunities here. It lands in Togo, so there’s restoration opportunity in Togo, but it doesn’t land in Ghana, for example, or Code d’Ivoire.
“One of the reasons these cuts have had such a significant impact is that four or five weeks ago, three cables were cut in the Red Sea, which also serves Africa.
So, if there hadn’t been the Red Sea cuts, a lot more of the traffic could have been restored going south from Nigeria around South Africa and back up the Red Sea. So this incident has been compounded by the cuts in the Red Sea,” Vanguard quoted Wood saying in a publication.
According to Wood, it will cost millions of dollars to repair the damaged cables.
“It’s millions of dollars, maybe between $1million and $2million per cable, depending on how long it takes the ship to find the cable and repair it.
“I can’t say exact figures because it depends on the nature of the cuts; how long it takes to repair them, but it’s when you look at the four systems together it is several, several millions of dollars,” he said.
Wood stated that WIOCC has made a sizable investment in a new cable called as 2 Africa in an effort to lower risks and stop similar events in the future.
The installation of the cable, which would link Lagos and Akwa Ibom, is now underway. With its ability to send data in both directions, it provides more than two levels of backup.
As a result, traffic from the southern region can still be supported even if the northern portion of the cable is broken.
