The Association of Licensed Telecoms Operators of Nigeria (ALTON) have rejected the plan of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) to stop the registration of subscriber identification module (Sim) cards on June 30, 2013.
ALTON said it will not terminate the exercise of registering SIM cards across the various networks.
The group’s Chairman, Gbenga Adebayo, said: “Given the reality of what we face today, you know we have had significant disruption in our activities in some parts of the country, which has also affected the movement of persons and business activities.
“So, circumstances in the last three or four months haven’t really helped situation as it were. Therefore, readiness, as we have today, I can say to you is not 100 per cent.”
According to him, disconnecting subscribers on the network is improper, adding that the regulator should show leadership and direction by first coming clean with information about the integrity of the data it gathered too in the course of the exercise.
“I think what the NCC itself should do is to provide a direction of the data base it has registered. Recall that we did some part and NCC also did some part.
“So, if NCC is putting the deadline of 30th of June, I think also situation demand that NCC should give a declaration of the readiness or integrity of the data it has recorded over the period before putting a blanket disconnection order on service providers.
“So, for me, I think before we go out to say subscribers that are unregistered should be disconnected, I think we should embark on data clean up where there will be integration of data registered by the operators and those registered by the regulator and after the outcome of that, we can take a decision either to disconnect or not.
“But as it is today, it will appear that NCC is sitting on its own data, no one knows the integrity of the data it has collated.
“We haven’t done harmonisation of the data collected by them and by us and the NCC is coming to give June deadline, I think there is need to review the decision again.
Speaking on the investment of the telecoms operators on the SIM registration exercise, Gbenga said: “May be when we come to the end of the exercise will be the time to talk about how much we have spent. Don’t forget that works are still ongoing.”
Director, Public Affairs, NCC, Tony Ojobo, told reporters that all the operators are expected to forward their data to the NCC. “NCC has stopped SIM reg but the operators are still doing it.
“They are still compiling data which they will send to the NCC at the end of the exercise,” he said.