Ken Okeke
The Minister of Communications, Innovation, and Digital Economy, Dr Bosun Tijan, has hinted that the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) will soon release modalities for tariff adjustment in the telecom industry.
The hike would however not be adjusted by 100 per cent as requested by the telecom operators, he assured.
Tijani said this during a stakeholder meeting with Mobile Network Operators (MNOs), adding that consultations and engagements were ongoing on the issue. According to him, very soon, the NCC will approve and make the new tariffs public to Nigerians.
“You have seen over the past weeks that some of these companies have been agitating to increase tariffs. They are requesting a 100% tariff increase. But it will not be 100 per cent.”
The NCC will soon come up with a clear directive on how we will go about it,” the Minister said. The Minister emphasized the need to ensure that the telecommunication sector gets its acts together to put the right regulations in place to ensure the growth of this sector. “We want to strike the balance as a government, to protect our people, but also protect and ensure that these companies can continue to invest significantly,” he said. The Minister also said that the Federal Government would no longer leave investments in infrastructure in the sector to private companies alone. “As a country, over time, we have left these investments in the hands of the private sector. They typically invest where they can see returns in the short to medium term. We will not want this conversation to just be about tariff increase. What the world is talking about today is meaningful connectivity, people want to have access to quality service. A part of it that the consumers may not be aware of is the investment that needs to go into the infrastructure that is used to deliver these services,” he said.
Also speaking, the Executive Vice-Chairman (EVC), of the NCC, Dr Aminu Maida, said the meeting with stakeholders was about the sustainability of the industry.
He said the regulators had looked at all of the factors in the industry and it is not likely that the Commission would approve a 100% tariff increase just as stated by the Minister. Acknowledging that Nigerians are agitated to hear the exact percentage approved, Maida said there are still other stakeholder engagements to be held, adding that the decisions would be communicated in one or two weeks’ time. He said that the NCC had put a number of tools and instruments in place to ensure compliance to service quality. He urged also the MNOs to adopt simplified templates to show Nigerians charges per minute for voice calls, SMS, and a megabyte of data.
“We are moving away from the regime where you will have a main rate, then you will now have a bonus which is at a different rate. It makes it often complicated and difficult for Nigerians to actually understand what they are being charged for. There is this agitation that the MNOs are stealing our data,” he said.
Airtel speaks
The CEO of Airtel Nigeria, Dinesh Balsingh, represented by Femi Adeniran, Airtel media spokesperson, said that the economic realities of rising operational and capital costs necessitated the proposed tariff adjustments. Balsingh said that for the telecommunications companies to deliver superior connectivity and foster digital inclusion, there is a need for tariff increments. “The economic realities of rising operational and capital costs necessitated the proposed tariff adjustments.
This is aimed at ensuring the long-term sustainability of the sector while unlocking significant benefits for Nigerian consumers,” he said.
The CEO of MTN Nigeria, Mr. Karl Toriola, recently said that the telecom industry is now facing a sustainability threat that must be addressed through a tariff review, adding that the telecom operators had put forward a request for a 100% increase.
While emphasizing that telecommunications is a fundamental human right and a critical element for driving an economy, Toriola said that without a sustainable industry, Nigerians’ economy and well-being will suffer.