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Tag: Gbenga Adebayo

  • ALTON, ATCON urge Minister on security, others

    THE Association of Licensed Telecoms Companies of Nigeria (ALTON) and Association of Telecoms Companies of Nigeria (ATCON)  on Thursday urged the new Minister of Communication, Dr Ibraahim Pantanmi on security of telecoms infrastructure and others.

    ALTON chairmna, Gbenga Adebayo, in a note to The Nation, said Pantami should facilitate the presidential declaration of information communication technology (ICT) as critical national security and economic infrastructure to accord the industry the needed protection.

    He said: “Elimination of issues of multiple regulation where the sector is subjected to multiple regulators on issues that are suppose to  be within the purview of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC); encourage and deliver strong local content policy in telecoms sector. We promise to support the minister to deliver his mandate.”

    ATCON President Olushola Teniola, urged Pantami to put in place, Nigerian Broadband Plan for 2019 to 2024.

  • Kogi threatens national security by shutting 150 BTS

    Telecoms operators on Monday raised the alarm over the unilateral shut down of about 150 base transmission stations (BTS) by the Kogi State government. They said the development would inevitably disrupt telecoms and banking services in Abuja, the seat of government and nine other adjoining states, especially those that are contiguous or share border with the state.

    The carriers also said national security would also be threatened as the various security agencies might not be able to communicate, especially during national emergencies.

    Acting through the aegis of Association of Licensed Telecoms Operators of Nigeria (ALTON), the carriers said efforts to get the matter resolved amicably were rebuffed by the state government which agents took locks and keys to shut the BTS.

    Its Chairman, Gbenga Adebayo, who spoke with reporters on Monday in Lagos, said the action of the state government was in breach of the directive of the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA) which said telecoms infrastructure is critical national infrastructure and should not be subjected to willful damage by any individual or group of persons.

    He said: “We wish to express our concern about the shutting down of telecoms facilities in Kogi State as a result of disputes arising from unusual taxes and levies demanded by the Kogi State government through its Ministry of Environment and Physical Planning, Ministry of Environment and Mineral Resources, Kogi State Environmental Protection Board, championed by the Kogi State Internal Revenue Service (KIRS).

    “This issue is likely to lead to a total communications blackout in the entire Kogi State, parts of Abuja the Federal Capital Territory and possible impact on service availability in some parts of Nassarawa, Benue, Enugu, Anambra, Edo, Ondo, Ekiti, Kwara, Niger states. These are states sharing borders with Kogi State.

    “This situation arises as a number of critical telecoms sites belonging to our members have been closed and sealed up by Kogi State government in an attempt to increase its Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) collection.

    Read Also: Kogi as mirror

    “This action followed an ex-parte court order obtained by the KIRS over unsubstantiated allegations that our members are in default of tax payments to the state government (which is not the truth) and access to these critical telecom sites has been denied.”

    According to him, as a result of these actions by the state government, telcos are unable to refuel power generators in these sites, a situation which has led to outage of over 150 sites including hub sites.

    While he said legal action has been taken to get the court order vacated, he said it has become imperative to bring the attention of the Federal Government, especially Vice President Prof Yemi Osinbajo who has been on the vanguard of ease of doing business and who has done so well in his quest to carry the private sector along in the development agenda of the government.

    “We are very concerned that this indiscriminate action has the potential of further leading to a total telecommunications outage in Kogi State with neighboring states and parts of the Federal Capital Territory adversely impacted.

    To the best of our knowledge, our members have settled all statutory levies and taxes due to the Kogi State government and have taken necessary steps to comply with local laws that govern business activities within Kogi State.

    Adebayo said the spurious charges include Annual Right of Way (ROW) renewal; Social Services Contribution; Employee Economic Development Levy; Mast Site Premises Renewal; and Fire Service Yearly Renewal.

    Others are from the Kogi State Environmental Protection Board are Payment of Environmental Levy; Failure to Submit an Environmental Impact Assessment Report; Failure to Register Industry; Failure to submit environmental audit report every two years; Storage of petroleum products and radioactive materials without written permission from KSEPB; Failure to comply with setbacks to roads, power lines and rivers/streams; and dumping of toxic or hazardous substances or hazardous substances or harmful waste without KSEPB approval.

    ALTON is worried that the action by KIRS will jeopardise communication services provided to security agencies such as the Nigeria Police Force, the Armed Forces in addition and to other emergency and social services in Kogi and other neighboring states. This will include affecting communication links to Bank Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) across those states.

    He said: “The outage currently being experienced is already affecting the ability of our members to provide uninterrupted service delivery to Commercial Banks, Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation and other critical agencies of government in the aforementioned locations.

    “It is pertinent to note that the office of the National Security Adviser to Mr. President has in the past communicated to the 36 state governments on the fact that telecommunications sites are Critical National Infrastructure (CNI). They are critical socio-economic and security infrastructure. The agency had strongly advised against sealing them as such actions would have negative implications on national security.

    “State governments were encouraged to explore other means of resolving tax related disputes rather than sealing telecommunications sites. It is therefore worrisome that the KIRS continue to ignore such advice.”

    He lamented that the telcos have also made several overtures to KIRS in the past months in a bid to resolve the disputed issues amicably but the agency has remained adamant. Rather than resort to the Tax Arbitration Tribunal for intervention as is expected of a government agency, KIRS has resorted to subtle intimidation by getting the sites shut in a bid to coerce our members into accepting the illegal taxes and levies, he added.

    “As an industry, this situation is very worrisome and of great concern and we hereby call on President Muhammadu Buhari  and Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, who is driving the Presidential Enable Business Council on Ease of Doing Business in Nigeria to prevail on the Kogi State Governor Alhaji Yahaya Bello to reign in on the matter to prevent a total blackout in communications services in Kogi, FCT and the other nine states of the federation which are now under threat due to what is happening to our network in Kogi State,” Adebayo said.

     

  • ALTON: We’ll advise MTN to consider shutdown if…

    The Association of Licensed Telecommunications Operators of Nigeria (ALTON) says it will advise MTN Nigeria to consider preventive shutdown of network if its picketing by the organised labour leads to damage to telecoms facilities.

    The ALTON Chairman, Mr Gbenga Adebayo, said that the shutdown would be necessary to avoid damage to network.

    Adebayo made this known in a statement in Lagos.

    He said that damage to telecom facilities would lead to disruption of critical national security and economic services which could expose citizens to danger.

    “We hereby strongly request government and its law enforcement agencies to intervene expeditiously, otherwise the association will advise its member to consider preventive shutdown,’’ he said.

    Adebayo said that disruption of operations of MTN through the picketing by the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) would lead to poor quality of services which would affect the country as a whole.

    “Members of ALTON are law-abiding organisations who are committed to best practices in all areas including labour-related matters.

    “Employees of our members are able to join or form associations and unions if they so desire.

    “However, the practice is that membership of associations and unions are voluntary, in line with fundamental human rights regarding freedom of association as guaranteed by the constitution.

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    “Individuals must not be compelled to join an association or union if they do not choose to do so,” he said.

    The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the NLC picketed MTN Nigeria on Monday and continued on Tuesday over alleged unfair labopir practices.

    The NLC President, Mr Ayuba Wabba, told journalists during picketing of MTN Headquarters in Lagos that the organised labour would not tolerate deprivation or enslavement of the Nigerian worker.

    Wabba said that MTN Nigeria refused to adhere to labour rules and allow its workers to belong to unions.

    MTN, however, denied the allegations.

  • No registered member of ALTON was sanctioned by NCC – Chairman

    No registered member of ALTON was sanctioned by NCC – Chairman

    Mr Gbenga Adebayo, the Chairman, Association of Telecommunications of Nigeria ( ALTON ) says no current registered member of the  association is sanctioned by Nigerian Communications Commission ( NCC ) implicated in call masking.

    NCC on Tuesday imposed a range of sanctions on licenses of operators implicated in call masking.

    Masked calling is a technique used in e-commerce to protect and cover buyers’ and sellers’ personal phone numbers as private.

    Adebayo told our reporter on Wednesday in Abuja that his members were responsible corporate citizens who operate according to the laws.

    “We are delighted that in the report issued by NCC, there is no current registered member of our association that was involved.

    “And what it also goes to show is that our members are responsible corporate people who operate according to the laws.

    “They work according to the terms of their licenses, so the assurance we will continue to give is that as responsible association we will continue to comply with the rules of operations,’’ he said.

    Adebayo said ALTON as a responsible corporate organisation and with the  amount of investment by its members in the country suggested they had to take rules and regulations guiding their operations seriously.

    The ALTON Chairman also assured subscribers that operators would continue to provide best services.

    “As an industry that provides infrastructure for many other sub sector of the economy, we will continue to do our best to contribute to national economic  development

    “I am delighted about the report by the Bureau of Statistics on the new Gross Domestic Product ( GDP ) that the number of sectors playing critical roles in the  development of the economy were supported by the telecom sector,’’ Adebayo said.

    The big players in the telecom sector such as MTN, Airtel, Globacom, Nine Mobile, are registered members of  ALTON.

    NCC barred over 750,000 numbers assigned to several Private Network Links (PNL) and Local Exchange Operator (LEO) licensees, which number ranges were found to have been utilised for the practice of call masking.

    It listed the licensees whose numbers have been barred to include Vezeti Communications Services Ltd., Voix Networks Ltd.,  Mobitel Ltd., Peace Global Satellite Communications Ltd.

    Others are ABG Communications Ltd.  Vodacom Business Africa (Nigeria) Ltd.,  Swift Telephone Networks Ltd. QVODA Telecoms Ltd., Wireless Telecoms Ltd. Emcatel Networks Ltd.

    NAN

  • Telecoms industry lost 21 operators in 10 years – ALTON

    The Association of Licensed Telecommunications Operators of Nigeria (ALTON) said on Friday that 21 telecommunications operators in the country have gone into extinction in the last 10 years.

    The ALTON Chairman, Gbenga Adebayo, stated this during the”Broadband Summit 2017,” organised by BusinessDay Media Limited in Lagos.

    Adebayo said the operators collapsed due to the country’s economic and operational challenges.

    “As at 2006, ALTON had 35 members, but between 2007 to date, its members had reduced to 14,” Adebayo said.

    He said if care is not taken, more service providers would close shop before the end of year.

    The ALTON chairman said firms that had stopped operations in the nation’s telecommunications space included Multilinks, Starcomms and O’Net.

    “The economic challenges include poor power generation, multiple taxation, exorbitant Right of Way levies, insecurity and over-regulation, among others.

    “The operational issues are anti-competition and lack of fund to roll out,” he added.

    NAN

     

  • Telecoms operators accuse NCC of undue criticism

    Telecoms operators accuse NCC of undue criticism

    Telecommunications operators have declared that the high spate of criticisms against them do not augur well for the industry.

    The operators, under the aegis of the Association of Licensed Telecommunication Operators of Nigeria (ALTCOM), said the continuous bad publicity for the sector was portraying the industry in a bad light.

    Chairman of the association, Gbenga Adebayo, accused the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) of emphasising the few lapses of the operators.

    The NCC, he said, should be aware that the criticised telecoms companies are contributing immensely to the growth of the economy and should not be consistently blamed for the nagging problems in the industry.

    He said that continually portraying the operators in a bad light will discourage further investment in the sector.

    “It is unfortunate that our telecoms sector, which is currently driving the growth of the economy, is being perceived in a bad light because of quality of service issues,” Adebayo lamented.

    He added: “The sector is currently contributing more to the GDP than even the banking industry. Despite these achievements, the industry is still being perceived badly.

    “This trend is not good for us as it makes investors to shy away from this market because of the continuous negative criticisms.”

    The NCC last week expressed readiness to announce new sanctions for network operators that fail to meet the expected quality of service.

    Its Executive Director, Dr Eugene Juwah, said the commission is currently collating data for analysis on the companies that will be sanctioned.

  • Harsh environment depletes ALTON’s membership

    THE Association of Licensed Telecoms Operators of Nigeria (ALTON) has said the harsh business operating environment has taken a toll on its membership, lamenting it has slumped from 35 to just only 12.

    Its President, Gbenga Adebayo, said the barriers that led to the extinction of the 23 firms were still there, adding that new licencees should be wary of the banana peels that led to the fall of the others.

    Adebayo, who spoke in Lagos at a forum organised by the Association of Telecoms Companies of Nigeria (ATCON), renewed calls for urgent classification of telecoms infrastructure as critical national infrastructure to insulate it from willful vandalism by meting out severe punishment on apprehended vandals.

    He said operators were working within a peculiar socio-political environment, which was affecting quality of services, insisting that fines and other sanctions will not enthrone high telecoms services.

    Adebayo recalled that when he travelled by road, he was appalled by the level of vandalism on the optic fibre cables laid by his members, adding that when he challenged the contractor handling the project, he said he was not aware that such an important infrastructure was buried beneath the earth surface.

    “In the beginning, ALTON’s membership was in the region of 35, but now, it is about 12. If we license new operators and fail to address the barriers, they may not succeed,” Adebayo said.

    Issues such as multiple taxation/regulation, slow grant of right of way, willful vandalism and theft of generators at base transmission station (BTS) were identified as some of the challenges besetting the industry. Operators also have to contend with running of BTS on diesel, a situation that has aggravated the operating cost of the service providers.