BREAKING NEWS, Business
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The Nigerian Communications Commission says its decision to sanction the MTN Nigeria is to protect the public interest as well as the nation’s law and order
THE Nigerian Communications Commission, NCC, has defended the sanctions placed on the MTN Nigeria, saying it was in public interest. The commission said that the MTN had acted in violation of Section 20(1) of the Registration of Telephone Subscribers Regulation of 2011.
Section 20 (1) of Registration of Telephone Subscribers Regulations 2011 states that: “Any licensee who activates or fails to deactivate a subscription medium in violation of any provision of these Regulations is liable to a penalty of N200,000.00 for each unregistered but activated subscription medium.”
Hence, the NCC said the fine of N1.04Trillion on MTN Nigeria by the corporation was done in the interest of members of the public who had been at the receiving end of security challenges.
“Consequent upon the overwhelming evidence of non-compliance, and obvious disregard to the rule of engagement by the MTN, the NCC had no choice but to impose the sanctions,” the NCC said in a statement signed Tony Ojobo, its director of public affairs.
Besides, the statement said that the MTN, in a letter of November 2, 2015 admitted the infraction and pleaded for leniency.
According to Ojobo had acknowledged the mercy plea and would look into the plea without any prejudice to the fine. He said the fine remained but the mode and time of payment could be affected.
That notwithstanding he revealed that the fine that imposed on the MTN was the second within two months after all telecom operators were given a seven-day ultimatum to deactivate all unregistered and improperly registered subscriber identification module, SIM, cards. He said while others complied with the directive, the MTN did not.
Giving an insight into the whole situation, Ojobo’s statement said: “On August 14, 2015, three days after the ultimatum expired, the NCC carried out a network audit, while other operators complied with the directive, to deactivate the improperly registered SIM cards, the MTN showed no sign of compliance at all.”
According to the NCC image maker, four Operators, namely, MTN, Airtel, Globacom and Etisalat, were sanctioned in August for none compliance of the directive to deactivate the improperly registered SIM cards.
At the time, the MTN got a fine of N102.2Million, Globacom N7.4Million, Etisalat N7Million and Airtel N3.8Million. Ojobo said others paid the fine while the MTN did not.
“Based on the report of the compliance audit team, an enforcement team which visited MTN from September 2 – 4, 2015 wherein MTN admitted that the team confirmed that 5.2million improperly registered SIM Cards were still left active on their network; hence, a contravention of the regulations was established.
“Consistent with the commission’s enforcement process, MTN was by a letter dated October 5, 2015, given notice to state why it should not be sanctioned in line with the Regulations for failure to deactivate improperly registered SIM Cards that were found to be active at the time of enforcement team’s visit of September 15, 2015.
“On October 19, 2015, the Commission received and reviewed MTN’s response and found no convincing evidence why it should not be sanctioned for the established violations,” he said.
Hence, based on its letter dated October 20, 2015 the NCC conveyed appropriate sanctions to the MTN in accordance with the law.
The NCC in the latter said that as a responsible regulator, it would not “stand by and watch rules and regulations for engagement being flouted by any operator.”
— Nov 18, 2015 @ 14:55 GMT
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