The Nigerian Communications Commission, NCC, yesterday said subscribers’ figures in the country have now reached 130 million. Eugene Juwah, NCC Executive Vice Chairman, who spoke at the NCC Special Day at the Abuja International Trade Fair, said the growth has been remarkable and significant.
Juwah who was represented by Tony Ojobo, the Commission’s Director, Public Affairs, said the sector began in 2001 with about 400,000 subscribers, noting that by this year, it was a miracle that 130 million Nigerians now use global system for mobile, GSM, communication.
“130 million subscribers, that is a phenomenon, that is a miracle. We believe that this nation is going to move forward, and just as we saw in the telecommunication sector, we are going to see the miracle in other sectors in this nation.”
He said in terms of employment opportunities, economic activities and value addition to the nation’s gross domestic product, GDP, the industry remained at the lead, stressing that soon, another revolution would be witnessed in the sector.
Mariam Biye, Director, Consumer Affairs Services, who also spoke at the event said the commission in partnership with the Consumer Consultative Council, CCC, is working out modalities on how compensation could be paid to consumers who have been at the receiving ends of poor quality of services from the various service providers.
She said the compensation so far paid by service providers as a result of various sanctions imposed on them are not in the coffers of NCC, but that of the federal government.
She said NCC is also working together with service providers to stop unsolicited text messages and unnecessary depletion of the accounts of GSM users by service providers on spurious and unfounded grounds, stressing that NCC had opened consumers’ complaint line-622- nationwide for subscribers.
She added that from investigations carried out recently by service providers, it was discovered that some consumers fell victim of reduction of their accounts due to the products they subscribe to and the type of handset they use.
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