ATCON Offers Solutions to Over-Regulation in Telecoms Sector

 
Although the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) is the statutory authority charged with the regulation of telecoms services in Nigeria, today, the telecoms sector has witnessed incursions into the regulatory space by other agencies including state and local governments, said Mr. Olusola Teniola, president of the Association of Telecommunications Company of Nigeria (ATCON).
 
Teniola, in an address read on his behalf by Engineer Tony Nwosu, 1st VP of ATCON at Nigeria Information and Communications Technology Reporters' Association (NITRA’s) quarterly meeting in Lagos on Friday, regretted that these agencies, especially from the State Governments, impose levies and fees on service providers for location towers, right of way, and make other laws that govern infrastructure in their domains.
 
According to him, “Regulation” was not known in the telecommunications sector until the sector was fully liberalized by the Nigerian Government over ten years ago, thus, the need for regulating the telecommunications sector was initially not cogent as it was only NITEL that was charged with the sole responsibility for providing telecommunications services for Nigerians.
 
“The Association of Telecommunications Companies of Nigeria painstakingly made several presentations to Federal Government on the urgent need to liberalise the sector for maximum benefits (Revenue Generation, FDI, and Employment Generation). The continuous focussed advocacy of ATCON gave birth to the robust modern telecommunications sector that we have in Nigeria today”, the ATCON President said.
 
He said, should over-regulation continues, poor Quality of Service (QoS) may persist, as the acts establishing these agencies have sometimes led to indiscriminate shut down of base stations and operator sites, leading to disruption of services.
 
He emphasised that the issue of multiple taxation and concurrent regulation in the telecoms industry has been a source of concern to industry players and a major source of friction between service providers and the intervening agencies; while in some cases, the matters have ended up in the law courts, and till date the issues appear unresolved.
 
“The Nigerian Communications Commission is empowered to establish minimum Quality of Service (QoS) standards in service delivery for the telecommunications industry. These QoS standards ensure that consumers continue to have access to high quality telecommunications service by setting basic minimum quality levels for all operators.
 
“The standards define the lower and upper bounds of acceptability of such technical issues as transmission rates, error rates, call completion rates, etc. and commercial consumer issues such as access to customer care centres, billing integrity and other characteristics that can be measured and improved.
 
“There is no doubt that the incessant shut down of telecoms facilities by multiple regulatory have an adverse effect on the quality of services offered by operators in the industry. The outages occasioned by these shut downs negatively impact quality of service indices such as reduced call completion rates, increased call drop rates, increased voice quality impairment, and transmission quality impairment. The overall implication of these is heightened consumer dissatisfaction with the quality of services provided by operators,” he said.
 
Teniola listed other implications of over-regulation in the telecoms industry as includes broadband roll-out delay.
 
According to him, “The incessant over regulation of the Nigerian telecommunications sector may lead to the inability of players in that sector to roll out services promptly to meet the targets in the National Broadband Plan.
 
Death or Extinction of Telecommunications Companies
“If over regulation of the industry is not checked, some of the service providers may be forced to close shop, and this would affect the sector contribution to the country’s GDP. Some telecoms service providers may be forced to relocate their services to neighbouring countries. Closure of companies or reduction in scope of activities may lead to job losses and worsen the unemployment situation in the country; and diversion of investment meant for telecoms industry to other sectors”.
 
Speaking on the way forward, he said, “There is the need for NCC to strengthen its relationships with each state of the federation and their relevant agencies to ensure a smooth operating environment for the delivery of telecoms services.
 
“Greater collaboration of industry associations and stakeholders to ensure a conducive-operating business environment for telecoms companies operating in Nigeria. Increased enlightenment and awareness on the importance of telecommunications services to national growth and development; and the federal government should collaborate with state and local governments on the issue of tax harmonization”.