The National Space Research and Development Agency (NASRDA) has raised fresh concerns about Nigeria\u2019s worsening security vulnerabilities, revealing that terrorist groups operating in the country have migrated from conventional mobile networks to satellite-based communication systems.\n<\/p>\n
NASRDA\u2019s Director General, Dr. Matthew Adepoju, disclosed this on Friday while appearing on Channels Television\u2019s Politics Today.\n<\/p>\n
He warned that shutting down mobile networks during security operations no longer disrupts terrorist activities, as criminal groups now rely on more sophisticated satellite channels.\n<\/p>\n
\u201cIt breaks my heart when state governments shut down communication on our mobile phones, because most of them are not actually communicating through mobile networks. They are making it through the satellite platform. The terrorists are using satellites to communicate,\u201d Adepoju said.\n<\/p>\n
He noted that many Nigerians misunderstand the capabilities of the country\u2019s existing satellites, explaining that they are designed for imaging\u2014not real-time video surveillance.<\/p>\n
\u201cSometimes, there\u2019s a misconception about what satellites should do and what they have the capacity to do. The one the military has and the one we\u2019ve launched in the agency are imagers. They don\u2019t record videos, and they travel around the globe,\u201d he said.\n<\/p>\n
Adepoju explained that Nigeria\u2019s current satellites\u2014NigeriaSat-1, NigeriaSat-X and NigeriaSat-2\u2014require an average of three days to revisit the same location, making rapid response to fast-moving security threats difficult.\n<\/p>\n
He said a new satellite constellation approved by President Bola Tinubu<\/a> would reduce revisit time to between four and six hours, depending on orbital placement.\n<\/p>\n The agency, he added, plans to continuously expand the fleet with four or five additional satellites to achieve near real-time monitoring capacity. <\/p>\n \u201cIf you want to have global coverage, we need to launch plenty of them into orbit. As one is going, another is coming. That\u2019s why we went for the constellation of the four that the president has approved for us,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n