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Nigeria to launch 'made in China' telecoms satellite
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    • LAGOS, Sept 21 (AFP) Sep 21, 2006
     Nigeria plans to launch a telecommunications satellite in March 2007, the country's space agency said on Thursday, noting that the device was currently being built in China.

    The new Nigerian satellite, to be called NIGCOMSAT-1, will be launched by China's Great Wall Industry Corporation, which won the contract to build the device in 2004, space agency director Robert Boroffice told the NAN news agency.

    NIGCOMSAT-1 is a geostationary satellite whose footprint will take in all of Africa plus parts of the Middle East and Southern Europe. It is designed to operate in the C, Ku, Ka and L bands.

    Boroffice said around 50 Nigerian engineers had originally been sent to China to work on the satellite project but that 25 had now returned to prepare the device's base station in Nigeria.

    The engineers remaining in China will work on NIGCOMSAT-1's launch.




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