Over 13 million Ugandans have access to internet

Minister Aidah Nantaba and her technical team before MPs. PHOTO/Maria Wamala.

Explaining the performance of the sector in the first half of the current financial year (July 2016 to December 2016), the state minister for ICT and national guidance Aidah Nantaba has revealed that telephone subscription had by December 2016 reached 23.2million active subscribers from 20.5million in December 2015.

Nantaba made the remarks while appearing before the House ICT committee on Thursday. 

The minister, who is also the woman MP for Kayunga district, told the Parliament ICT committee that the sector has also witnessed a surge in internet subscriptions to 13.9million Ugandans by December 2016 from 7.3million subscribers as of December 2015.

Nantaba attributed the increase in internet subscriptions to the reduction in the average unit cost of internet bandwidth from $650 per mbps (megabits per second) per month in 2013 to $300   per mbps per month in 2016.

The number of people employed in the ICT sector, according to the minister, increased from 1.5million in 2011 to 3million by December 2016 and the sector's contribution to the GDP rose from 4.2% in 2011 to 8.1%.