Telecoms Providers, Subscribers Lament Challenges

The concluding part of the story published Friday,
August 1, 2014.

Daniel also said the
company had reduced its Turn-Around Time, a period during which customers’ complaints are addressed, to less than one hour, as part of efforts to satisfy customers.
On differences in the cost of recharge cards in Gombe, he said the company had set up a committee to ensure uniform prices.
He said the company was using the media to sensitise the public to the services which Globacom offered as well as other issues that would improve its service delivery.
Miss Paula Paul, New Dawn Manager of MTN Trade Partner in Gombe, said the company had bought 3G network facility to increase the strength of its services, especially for those browsing on the network.
However, The Tide source revealed that as part of solutions to the various problems observed, operators like MTN, GLO and Etisalat have installed the 3G system.
GLO has also opened smaller offices in the headquarters of local government areas across the country to get their services closer to subscribers at the grass-roots level.
Subscribers, on their part, called on the Nigeria Communications Commission (NCC), as a regulatory body, to try and curtail the excesses of operators found to be short-changing subscribers.
The Director of Public Affairs, NCC, Mr Tony Ojobo, informed that subscribers had legal rights to call the hot line of the commission to report any ill treatment by the network providers across the country.
He said subscribers would have to ensure that the network provider actually short-changed by reporting first to the providers before calling on the NCC for intervention.
Ojobo also said that vandalism of facilities of network providers had been a big challenge to the sector and that there was a bill before the National Assembly to address the problem.
He also advised telephone users to get certified mobile phones whenever they purchase a new phone.
According to the NCC spokesman, epileptic services on the network are due partly to the fact that some mobile phones which the subscribers use do not have the capacity of receiving calls at a close range.
On telemarketing, Ojobo said, “it is global practice, hence, it is impossible to ban it in the country.’’
He said the commission tried to regulate the timing of such messages so as not to inconvenience subscribers, adding that the time was now restricted to between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m.
He urged subscribers who were still being inundated with such unsolicited text messages at odd hours to sue the telecoms operators involved for invasion of their privacy.
According to him, the NCC is watching the operators and anyone that flouts the regulation on telemarketing would be punished.
He said that apart from issues bordering on unsolicited SMS, consumers could also ‘take the telecoms firms to task’ on account of the poor services being rendered to them.
“I think time has come for people to assert their rights. It is only in the telecoms industry that the people want the regulator to do everything for them.
“People should also take up the responsibility at some point to demand their rights from their service providers. That is the point we have made; people can take the service providers to court.
“It is not everything that the regulator should handle. In order climes, people have gone to court for even lesser matters. “We need to be able to put our laws to test. It is a contract! Every network has a contractual obligation in its drive to provide services for members of the public,’’ Ojobo said.
The Corporate Service Executive of MTN Nigeria, Mr Wale Goodluck, said that the issue regarding capacity to accommodate subscribers was essentially in the hands of the operators.
Goodluck said that it behoved operators to have a good understanding of the demands of customers and to put in place the capacity to meet them.
“The good news is that operators have the resources to install the required capacity but the reality is that it is extremely difficult to put infrastructure on ground in our environment.
“The same infrastructure challenges that have bedevilled the power industry also affect the telecommunications industry,” he said.
Goodluck stressed that telecoms infrastructure could not exist in a vacuum as there ought to be a parallel growth in other sectors for full realisation of the benefits of the increased rollout.
The Chairman, Association of Licensed Telecommunications Operators of Nigeria, Mr Gbenga Adebayo, said that the challenges in the sector remained enormous and had been hampering capacity rollout.
Adebayo cited the insecurity of telecoms infrastructure, a phenomenon which, he said, manifested prominently in the 2012 terror attacks on telecoms facilities in some parts of the country.
He said that the operators faced other challenges such as multiple taxation, difficulty in obtaining the Right of Way (RoW), as well as different levies imposed by some states and local governments.
Adebayo said that some of these issues hampered efforts to erect base stations that would boost the quality of services offered by service providers.
It would be recalled that no fewer than 30 base stations were bombed while several others were damaged in the 2012 terror attacks on telecoms installations, and some of the facilities have yet to be rebuilt due to lack of access to the sites.
Recent reports revealed that telecoms firms recorded a minimum of 70 cases of vandalism of its infrastructure monthly in different parts of the country.

Special Adviser to the Rivers State Governor on ICT, Engr. Goodlife Nmekini (right), presenting Ipad to Head of Department, Paediatrics, Braitwait Memorial Specialist Hospital, Port Harcourt, Dr. Ajibola Alabi (middle), during Governor Chibuike Ameachi’s inspection of installed ICT facility by the State ICT Department at the hospital recently. With them is Dr. Josephine Aiya.