When he assumed duties at the headquarters of the Nigeria Communication Commission (NCC) in Abuja last Friday as the new helmsman of the regulatory body, he left no one in doubt as to his mission.
“I want to pledge that I will bring to bear my wealth of experience in tackling the issue of quality of service in order to meet the expectations of the public that we are servicing,” Prof Umaru Danbatta told workers of the Commission on his first day in office.
Having been part of the NCC as vice president of the Digital Bridge Institute (DBI), the skilled manpower training arm of the Commission, Prof Danbatta is by no means a new comer to the telecoms sector.
“Service providers no longer flash with codes but the conventional 11-digit GSM numbers. When you see the missed call, you are always tempted to return the call and when you do that, a strange voice will be advertising its services to you. It is very annoying and the new NCC Chief should do something about it”
Quality of service palaver
Over the years, subscribers’ figures have grown phenomenally while quality of service (QoS) has remained an almost intractable challenge. When Dr. Juwah took over from Ernest Ndukwe who spent 10 years, he came up with what he called his six-point agenda. These were: consolidating on the gains of his predecessor; taking drastic measures to improve QoS; enhance broadband penetration; improving competition; providing diversified choices for subscribers; and improving NCC’s presence in the international space.
According to the NCC, the total number of mobile subscribers in the country has risen from 144 million in May to 146 million in June this year. In addition, Nigeria’s mobile operators added 2.1 million new subscribers in June with the subscriptions to fixed networks increasing from 181,625 in May to 182,643 within the same period. This is by every standard, a huge growth.
During Juwah’s tenure, the mobile network operators (MNOs) were sanctioned a couple of times through the imposition of fines (which Juwah admitted the MNOs prefer to pay to complying with laid down guidelines).
Sector analysts say Prof Danbatta must treat QoS issue using the carrot and stick approach. President, Nigeria Internet Group (NIG), Bayo Banjo said all the fines that have been imposed on the service providers were not severe enough to serve as punishment and assure deterrence by others.
Banjo argued that each time the NCC imposes fines on the service providers, all the operators do is to configure their ‘system’ such that when N10 is deducted from the account of all their customers, they effortlessly recoup the fines.
According to him, the regulator should go a step further by not limiting itself to the imposition of fines but actually removing the chief executive officers (CEOs) of non-performing MNOs. He said by the time one CEO is fired the way the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) fires the CEOs of non-performing banks, others will wake up.
“The NCC should also compel the MNOs to improve on their response time to consumers’ complaints, especially when the customers have to call the call centre through the codes provided. The current practice whereby customers are kept endlessly waiting to be attended to is not the best. Many customers don’t even get attended to at the end of the day and the distance between the physical offices of these telcos to their customers is unacceptable,” a subscriber, Mrs. Florence Chikke said.
Unsolicited SMS, calls, ‘flashing’
Aside poor QoS, the average teleoms subscriber in Nigeria has to live daily with the pains of unsolicited short message service (SMS) and their attendant distractions; unsolicited calls in the name of telemarketing and ridiculously too, ‘flashing’ all in an effort to make the customer make calls.
The NCC under Juwah said it had reached an understanding with the MNOs over these issues but the understanding has not translated to any relief for the subscribers.
When The Nation took the issue up with the former EVC, he expressed shock, raising questions as to whether the MNOs actually do what they do selectively. “Service providers no longer flash with codes but the conventional 11-digit GSM numbers. When you see the missed call, you are always tempted to return the call and when you do that, a strange voice will be advertising its services to you. It is very annoying and the new NCC chief should do something about it,” a legal practitioner, Onyekachi Aguomuo said.
Though the MNOs have blamed some of these on ‘rogues’ who take advantage of the unregulated internet to unleash ‘terror’ on the subscribers, sector analysts say the operators should be forced to invest more on firewalls to protect the network against undue attack.
National Broadband Plan
The NCC will have to show the way in realising the ambitious targets of the National Broadband Plan launched by the former administration. Already, the Commission said it is building optic fibre cables to provide in addition to what the MNOs have to give the necessary backhaul infrastructure support and complementing this with the open access model under which licences would be issued to infrastructure providers (Infracos) in the six geo-political zones of the country and one for Lagos. MainOne has been licensed under this scheme. According to Juwah, based on the business plans of the licencees, funds would be provided for roll-out of services.
Banjo has criticised the idea of funding private firms with tax payers money, arguing that it will breed corruption as the people that will get the “billions will be friends of people in government while a negligible percentage of the licences will be genuine operators.
“The idea of providing funding should be discouraged completely because it is not in line with the anti-corruption crusade of Mr. President,” an industry player said.
Commenting on the implementation of the NBP, Airtel CEO, Segun Ogunsanya said achieving the NBP will require possibly up to 50 per cent more than the $3billion-$4billion Nigerian operators have been spending on capital expenditure (CAPEX) annually, an increment that would need to be justified by a material change in operating conditions that would improve investment confidence.
Enthroning fair competition
Over the years, concernd stakeholders have been complaining about structural inbalances in the system largely because of the lack of laws which ought to have protected the weak from the strong.
The NCC carried out a study about two years ago that showed that there were dominant operators in the sector, especially in the voice segment. It directed the concerned operators to take steps to remedy the situatiion. It is not clear if one of the affected operators have complied with the directive of the regulator. This issue has however become a subject of litigation before a regular and competent court of law in the country.
Prof Danbatta should take measures to protect the weak operators from the strong because that is the essence of fair and unbiased regulation. The week also have a right to exist afterall they also pay tax to the government and employ Nigerians in their companies too.
Telephony penetration
Though subscriber figures have been going up, there are so many rural communities across the country that are yet to enjoy the dividends of the telecoms revolution. The huge resources available at the disposal of the Universal Service Provision Fund (USPF) should be judiciously applied to bridge the digital divide. Prof Danbatta should meet with stakeholders in the industry to map out strategies to ensure that in the 21st century, no community is cut off from civilisation.
It is gladdening that the fund had carried out a survey which showed that over 250 communities spread across the 36 states of the federation and Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) are still disenfranchised.
Review of NCA Act
Another important issue the university don will have to push is to get the National Assembly repeal the National Communication Act 2003 to take care of emerging trends in the industry that were not envisaged when the law was enacted. One of them for instance is the power to remove the CEOs of telcos that fail to keep to the key performance indicators (KPIs) signed with the regulator and MNOs.
Both Juwah and Ndukwe agree on the need to review the Act as they argue that the law has become outdated in view of emerging trends in the telecoms industry.
