27M SIMS RISK DISCONNECTION ON SUNDAY HOURS to the deadline set by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), an investigation has revealed that about 27 million Subscribers Identification Modules (SIMs) may be disconnected if they are not registered by June 30. As at Monday, virtually none of the telecommunications operators has confidently recorded 100 per cent compliance from its subscribers on the registration of their SIMs. This is despite various campaigns, advertorials and freebies offered by the service providers to woo subscribers to confirm the status of their SIMs and if not registered, to do so. Ahead of the SIM registration deadline, operators had sent several short message services (SMS) to subscribers to remind them of the deadline, in addition to various telemarketing calls. MTN for instance claimed to have wooed its unregistered subscribers with a gift of free airtime of N400. But going by investigations, virtually all the players, including Airtel, Globacom, Etisalat, even the troubled Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA), Visafone, Starcomms and Multilinks put together may lose close to 27 million subscribers from their networks. Findings revealed that while some subscribers are dead, others have relocated. There is also the challenge of inadequate registration agents, especially in the hinterlands. The trouble spots in the country are another challenge to the operators, as they claim lack of access to those areas. Some SIMs have also been damaged and lost. In an MTN Group’s financial report, released from South Africa, the company claimed that its Nigerian arm has recorded about 87 per cent compliance with the SIM card registration, stressing that more efforts and campaigns could still encourage others yet to register to do so. MTN Nigeria currently has over 52 million subscribers, the highest in the country. Other players, including Airtel, Glo and Etisalat, will also be affected by the NCC deadline, as all of them are yet to get their subscribers to register their SIMs. NCC statistics put Airtel, Globacom and Etisalat subscribers at 24.1 million; 24.3 million and 15.1 million respectively. But the President of the National Association Telecommunications Subscribers of Nigeria (NATCOMS), Chief Deolu Ogunbanjo, has appealed to NCC to extend the deadline by three months, which he described as “one-way final” warning. Ogunbanjo, who recalled that NCC introduced the SIM registration programme in March 2011 and was to end it in September 2011, said “NATCOMS asked for a 12-month extension while the Association of Licensed Telecommunications Operators of Nigeria (ALTON) asked for a nine-month extension. “Perhaps, NCC added 12 months and nine months together and extended by 21 months, which is now expiring on June 30, 2013.” The NATCOMS boss noted that there had been various issues around the exercise in the last three weeks. According to him, during the SIM registration, some “umbrella registration agents” were not collecting the full details needed because of their rush to register many subscribers so as to get paid. He added that some of these agents were asking subscribers to pay N100 before registration, which according to him, discourages subscribers. According to Ogunbanjo, some of the agents who belong to some network operators collect other operators’ SIM cards for registration in order to shore up the number of SIM cards they register daily. He added that some agents copy their daily registered subscribers and give to their colleagues in business as some form of ‘help’. “In view of the submissions above, a lot of subscribers will be locked out due to no fault of theirs as they think they have registered their SIM cards. “Against the backdrop of this and in order to ensure that every subscriber is given fair consideration, we are appealing to the NCC to give Nigerian subscribers a three-month one-way final warning extension on SIM cards registration. (i.e. subscribers to be able to receive calls).” But in an interview, the Director of Public Affairs at NCC, Dr. Tony Ojobo, re-affirmed the commitment of NCC to disconnecting every unregistered SIM by June 30. “There cannot be any extension. June 30 is definite”, he stated.
Posted on: Sat, 29 Jun 2013 10:00:06 +0000
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