3 months after, subscribers reject portability

Three months after the Nigeria Communications Commission (NCC) introduced the Mobile Number Portability (MNP) scheme, subscribers in the country insist they do not want the scheme.





Speaking with the Nigerian Tribune on the MNP scheme, a major stakeholder in the telecommunications sector, who preferred not to be identified or quoted, described the scheme as a “total waste of time,” while insisting that the scheme would not work.



Similarly, Stephen Ademola, a subscriber, said he was “totally against the scheme from the outset,” while adding that “ no one is porting because the networks are all the same.”



He said he had four SIM cards and, therefore, if one failed to work, he would immediately switch to another.



Meanwhile, the National Association of Telecommunications Subscribers (NATCOMS), in a letter issued to the Association of Licensed.

Telecommunications Operators of Nigeria (ALTON), requested for compensation for all subscribers in Nigeria, who, it said, had suffered poor quality service from the service providers in the last 12 years.



President of NATCOMS, Chief Deolu Ogunbanjo, in the letter, insisted that Nigerians should be fully rewarded and compensated for the huge number of years they had coped with poor services by various service providers.



Ogunbanjo, therefore, suggested that each subscriber be given a sum of N5,000 free airtime by their respective operators “after 12 years of groaning inpains as a result of poor quality service of the telecommunications operating companies.”



According to him, some of the network problems which Nigerians have been battling with for years include, drop calls, fluctuating calls, call disconnection from service providers, payment for un-sent SMS, subtle deduction of subscribers’ airtime and, It will be recalled that part of the guidelines issued by the NCC when MNP was launched on the 22nd April 2013, was that a subscriber would be only allowed to re-port his line after using the new network for 90 days. But this, according to information gathered, has been a bone of contention among subscribers and the regulatory body.



The Executive Vice Chairman of NCC, Dr. Eugene Juwah had at the launch, said the portability scheme would help subscribers to be at liberty to “fire or hire” any operator by switching from one service provider to another without having to buy a new SIM card.



Tribune



source: nigerianeye