As clearly stated in its first part, this article is entirely a public policy advocacy. This means that both the facts and logic are meant to dissuade public policy makers from issuing licences to telecommunication operators for the deployment of 5G technology in Nigeria now and in the near future until the serious concerns over the potential negative impact of 5G on public health are resolved. I am fully aware that this perspective may conflict with official positions in either the Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy or that of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC). Expectedly, one such official reaction has been received from Dr. Omoniyi Ibietan (a staff of the NCC). Before proceeding to conclude the article, the four-paragraph comment below is a reaction from him on the first part of this article:
First, I feel Prof. Obasi belongs to the school of theorists who believe that all EMFs are carcinogenic. So, what he has done was to rely on materials that reinforce his conviction. This is sad. He’s a scholar and ought to be objective. He displays rigour but in a lopsided manner. He needs to give a modicum of weight to the other side of the debate.
Secondly, it is strange that his writing did not make reference to the trove of works already done on radiation by the International Commission for Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP), the international body whose guidelines on EMF shape deployment of radiation-prone technologies. The ICNIRP certified 5G as safe because its deployment does not generate higher radiation than previously deployed mobile generation networks. Prof. Obasi also made reference to WHO but only the positions of WHO that resonates with his belief.
He may wish to review his thought in the light of my observation and accommodate such in the second part of the write-up so we can have a more objective submission…
Finally, please he may wish to know that Nigeria does not have a Federal Ministry of Technology and Digital Economy. There’s is Ministry of Science and Technology, and there’s Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy. I believe he meant the latter because that’s the Ministry supervising NCC and the Minister is Dr. Isa Ali Ibrahim Pantami, although the name is right but not the appropriate designation.
Dr. Ibietan’s observations are well taken as I expect him to advance his official position with the facts and logic that support such. If both of us are before the Public Hearing session of the National Assembly (NASS), I expect him to canvass his views while I do mine. This is what my public advocacy approach demands of me. May I, however, thank Dr. Ibietan for pointing out the regrettable error in the mix-up of the Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy. I attribute it entirely to printer’s devil as I had the correct name of the ministry in my first draft prior to my own final editing.
As for the other issues he raised, I do not belong to those who believe that all EME’s are carcinogenic, rather I belong to those who share the view as propagated in new studies (e.g. by National Toxicology Programme and other epidemiological investigations clearly mentioned in the article) that confirm that RF-EMF radiation is carcinogenic to humans. This forms the basis of my advocacy, as I share Martin Rees’ popular maxim that says absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. I also made this point clearly that what is at stake now is not that there is a research linking COVID-19 and 5G, but rather that the suspected potential health risk calls for more time to carry out proper investigation before the deployment of 5G. Who knows if a link will be established by such investigations?
Secondly and on a more serious note, Dr. Ibietan accused me of not making reference to the International Commission for Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP) which I actually planned to refer to in this second part of the article. The main issue indeed is that 5G Appeal to European Union (which as of September 13, 2017 was made up of 332 signatories) dismissed the current ICNIRP ‘safety guidelines’ as obsolete. In fact, it persuasively argued that such ‘safety guidelines’ protect industry and not health. (Note that the safety guidelines are put in inverted commas). As far as the signatories of the 5G Appeal are concerned, all proofs of harm caused by the radiation are even below the ICNIRP safety guidelines (emphasis added). The 5G Appeal, therefore, concluded that there was need for a revised ‘safety standards’ in the light of new findings/evidence.
Furthermore, according to them, the reason for the misleading guidelines is that conflict of interest of ICNIRP members due to their relationships with telecommunications or electrical companies undermine the impartiality that should govern the regulation of Public Exposure Standards for non-ionizing radiation’. They argued pungently again that ‘to evaluate cancer risks it is necessary to include scientists with competence in medicine, especially oncology’ (again emphasis added). Moreover, they argued once again that ‘the current ICNIR/WHO guidelines for EMF are based on the obsolete hypothesis that ‘the critical effect of RE-EMF exposure relevant to human health and safety is heating of exposed tissue’.
However, scientists have since ‘proven that many different kinds of illnesses and harms are caused without heating (‘non-thermal effect’) at radiation levels well below ICNIRP guidelines’ (emphasis also added on both bold prints).
My advocacy is also supported by the fact that 5G Appeal argues that 5G will ‘lead to massive increase of mandatory exposure to wireless radiation’. This is because according to the scientists, 5G technology is effective only over short distance, as it is poorly transmitted through solid material, making the use of many new antennas necessary. And full-scale implementation will require the use of antennas in every 10 to 12 houses in urban areas, with the result that nobody can avoid to be exposed. For us in this advocacy, these facts cannot be easily ignored.
It is important to point out that opposition to 5G is a global phenomenon even in countries where it has already been deployed or being deployed. In the United States of America for instance, the National Aeronautics and Space Agency (NASA) among others raised serious concerns following the observed potential negative impact of 5G on weather forecast accuracy which could be up to 30% reduction. Particularly 5G’s ‘interference to satellite operations impairs numerical weather prediction performance with substantially deleterious economic and public safety impacts in areas such as commercial aviation’ (see different reports by Jason Samenow in Washington Post of March 8, 2019; Alexandra Witze in Nature News of April 26, 2019, & Ron Brackett in The Weather Channels of May 1, 2019).
Coming home to our policy makers again, the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has assured Nigerians that there is nothing to worry about 5G technology since its radiation limit is considered safe for humans, and that there is no correlation between 5G Technology and COVID19. In an elaborate press release of April 5, 2020 and signed by Director, Public Affairs, Dr. Henry Nkemadu, the NCC said that the radiation from 5G is not different from those of 2G, 3G, and 4G, as all of them belong to the Non-ionizing Radiation. The Commission goes further to say that ‘safety and human health are top priority in the design and deployment of 5G’. Listing the benefits of 5G, it says that ‘5G technology will transform the world by connecting everything with everybody. It will create millions of jobs, it will add billions of dollars to the economy (GDP) and can solve some of our problems such as insecurity and improve governance and efficiency in the society’. Like its supervising ministry also said, it added that there is no link whatsoever between 5G and COVID-19 (emphasis added). With respect to whether the NCC has issued licences for 5G in Nigeria, it said no, and that NCC is technology neutral since it does not license technology but rather assigns spectrum to operators for deployment of any service.
With that assurance given by NCC regarding Nigerians’ safety in the 5G era, we can only hope that the NCC will do the needful by making sure that the serious concerns raised in this advocacy, are not just dismissed as lacking in merit. In fact, our public policy makers have the responsibility to address these concerns and many others not raised in this article before issuing out licences to 5G operators.
Prof. Obasi, a public policy expert teaches in the Department of Public Administration at the University of Abuja. Email: nnamdizik@gmail.com
