…Operators lose billions of Naira to vandalism, theft—Maida
By Charles Ebi
Recent concluded verification of the National Identification Numbers ,NINs, linked with mobile SIMs has led to a significant drop in the subscriptions database of all mobile network operators in the country as MTN, Airtel, Globacom, and 9mobile yanked off 64.3 million lines.
According to the latest data released on Monday by the Nigerian Communications Commission ,NCC, the huge loss was significantly driven by two of the operators, Globacom and 9mobile, which shed massive weight due to unverified NINs during the exercise that closed on September 14.
Globacom, which had 62.1 million active subscriptions as of March was left with 19.1 million subscriptions at the end of September, losing a whopping 43 million subscriptions.
Similarly, 9mobile, which had lost numerous customers in the past years was left with only 3.6 million active subscriptions at the end of September.
As of March, 9mobile’s subscription database stood at 11.6 million, indicating that the telecom operator had lost about eight million subscriptions to the NIN verification exercise
This action left the four GSM operators with a total of 154.6 million active subscriptions at the end of September from 219 million recorded in March this year.
Despite the sanitization and pruning exercise on the telecom operators’ databases, MTN Nigeria still maintained its top spot in the market with 78 million active subscriptions as of September.
The company, however, also lost 3.7 million subscriptions to the exercise as its active subscriptions database stood at 81.7 million in March.
Airtel Nigeria, which occupies the second position, ended September with 53.7 million active subscriptions.
The telco also lost about 9.6 million subscriptions over the last six months bringing its database down from the 63.3 million it recorded in March.
Although the two quoted companies, MTN and Airtel, are not impacted as much as Globacom and 9mobile, this is bound to impact their Q3 2024 revenue, which will soon be released.
Before the final exercise, the operators had reported possible impacts of the exercise on their bottom lines.
Airtel Africa, the parent company of Airtel Nigeria, had in its financial results for the quarter ended June 30, 2024, disclosed that it could lose up to $4 million in monthly revenue due to the verification of customers’ NIN in Nigeria.
As of that time, Airtel reported that it had not been able to verify the NIN of about 4.9 million customers.
Earlier, MTN also declared that it had disconnected 4.2 million lines that were not linked with NIN as of February 28, 2024. It, however, noted that that had minimal impact on its revenue as the affected customers were ‘low-value subscribers’.
Speaking on the development, a telecom expert, Mr. Adewale Adeoye, said the last verification exercise appeared to be the most thorough and the huge decline in operators database means that the system has been thoroughly sanitized.
“This is a good development for Nigeria and the telecom industry. It means that every Nigerian on the telecom network is now properly identified, which will promote decent use of telecommunication services.
“I hope that the Nigerian security forces will make use of this to address the insecurity in the country or else the whole exercise will be a waste of time and resources”,he said.
Earlier this month, the Executive Vice-Chairman of the Nigerian Communications Commission ,NCC, Dr. Aminu Maida declared all mobile lines in use in Nigeria have been linked with NIN following the conclusion of the implementation of the federal government’s 2020 policy of linking every phone number to a NIN in September.
“Today, there is no phone number that we cannot associate with a verified NIN. Not just a number, but a number that has been verified.
“If this phone number is involved in fraud or any crime, I can now authoritatively say, based on the NIN linked to it, this is the person who is using that phone number”, Maida said while speaking at the 2024 Annual Corporate Governance Conference held in Lagos.
The compulsory linkage of NIN with SIM began in December 2020 when the government directed telecommunication companies to bar unregistered SIM cards and SIMs that were not linked to NIN.
However, several deadlines were fixed until August this year when the NCC fixed a final deadline of September 14 for not just linking but also verification of all NINs linked with SIMs.
Before that, many telecom subscribers/consumers were unable to make or receive phone calls between July 28 and 29, as the telecom operators barred millions of lines ahead of the July 31 earlier fixed by the regulator.
This, however, led to chaos as many subscribers that besieged the telco stores went violent. The action also coincided with a planned nationwide protest scheduled for August 1 to 10.
This prompted the NCC to make a U-turn, by ordering all telecommunication companies in the country to reactivate all lines they had barred.
The telecom regulator, however, noted that the suspension of the blockage was for a limited period to allow them to properly link their NIN to their SIM.
Meanwhile the Executive Vice Chairman of the Nigerian Communications Commission ,NCC, Dr. Aminu Maida, has equally stated that telecommunications operators in Nigeria are currently facing immense challenges with frequent fibre cuts, vandalism, and theft of equipment costing them billions of Naira.
Maida stated this against the backdrop of the recent declaration of telecom infrastructure as Critical National Information Infrastructure ,CNII, by President Bola Tinubu through an Executive Order.
Delivering the keynote address at the launch of the CNII Protection and Resilience Workshop, organized by the National Cybersecurity Coordination Centre ,NCCC, under the Office of the National Security Adviser, Maida said Nigeria is now set to address the challenge.
While noting that workshop series was to drive the urgent implementation of the CNII Executive Order as a major step towards securing Nigeria’s communications and digital infrastructure, the NCC boss said:
“The telecom industry faces significant challenges, including frequent fibre cuts, vandalism, and theft, which cost operators billions of Naira in revenue and billions of Naira in repair expenses.
“Additionally, restricted access to telecom facilities by property owners and government entities hampers network expansion efforts, limiting connectivity and impacting service quality”.
Over the years, stakeholders in the Nigerian ICT sector have been calling on the government to designate telecom infrastructure as a critical national asset to address the persistent attacks on the infrastructure across the country.
In March this year, the Chairman of the Association of Licensed Telecommunications Operators of Nigeria, Gbenga Adebayo, reiterated the call as Nigeria suffered an internet outage due to damage on some fibre optic cables.
In 2023 alone, MTN Nigeria said it suffered more than 6,000 cuts on its fiber cable. The operator relocated 2,500 kilometers of vulnerable fiber cables between 2022 and 2023, at a cost of more than N11bn —enough to build 870 kilometers of new fiber lines in areas without coverage.
Earlier this month, the Chief Executive Officer of Airtel Nigeria, Carl Cruz, while speaking during an industry forum, said the telecom company has been recording an average of 1,000 cases of fibre cuts every month.
Meanwhile, the designation of telecom infrastructure as a critical national asset may not address the challenge except the government shows the political will to enforce the Order.
In June 2020, the immediate past Minister of Communications, Dr. Isa Pantami announced a similar action by former President Muhammadu Buhari.
According to Pantami, Buhari approved and also directed that necessary physical protective measures be put in place to safeguard telecommunications infrastructure deployed across the country.
With the presidential directive, the Minister said the Office of the National Security Adviser ,ONSA, Defence Headquarters ,DHQ, Nigeria Police Force ,NPF, Department of State Security Services ,DSS, and the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps ,NSCDC, had been notified of the President’s directive and are expected to enforce same as directed.
However, this failed to have any impact as vandalism of the infrastructure has remained a daily occurrence across the country to date.
