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Nigeria said it has suspended plans for a 2025 satellite launch blaming paucity of cash. Dr. Halilu Shaba, Director General, National Space Research and Development Agency (NASRDA), said the 2025 date was no longer realistic.
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Shaba, who was speaking at the 8th Science, Technology, and Innovation (STI) Expo in Abuja, remarked that the required fund was beyond the financial capacity of the agency.
Besides, the country has lost on timing as the process to plan and secure a launch slot for an astronaut takes approximately five years.
It is now impracticable to train an astronaut without a confirmed slot because the individual might age and no longer be fit for space travel by the time a slot becomes available, the NASRDA said.
Getting an astronaut into space and launching a locally manufactured satellite by 2025 was part of the original 25-year plan of NASRDA.
But with an economy in throes, Nigeria is cutting down on several ambitious plans including setting up its own Assembly, Integration, and Testing Laboratory (AITL).
Shaba said with its own AITL, Nigeria could have its own space industry robust enough to generate in excess $20 million from the launch of a single satellite.
NASRDA and Nigerian Communications Satellite Ltd (NIGCOMSAT) manage Nigeria’s satellite assets. Established in 1999, NASRDA has four low earth observation satellites under its purview. They are NigeriaSat-2 and NigeriaSat-X still active in space; and EduSat-1 and NigeriaSat-I that are no longer in orbit.
NIGCOMSAT Ltd has only one asset in space, a communication satellite: NigComSat-1R, a replacement communications satellite for NigComSat-1 that was deorbited in 2008 due to power failure shortly after launch 2007 in China.
