President of the Senate, Senator Godswill Akpabio, has declared that Nigerians deserve far better telecommunications services than what they are currently getting from network operators, insisting that subscribers must no longer be forced to bear the financial burden, pains and frustration arising from failed connections, incessant dropped calls and unexplained, unjustified deductions of their airtime and data.
The Senate President made the declaration on Tuesday during plenary at the National Assembly in Abuja, while reacting to the avalanche of complaints from millions of Nigerians across the six geo-political zones who have continued to lament the poor quality of service, exploitative billing and lack of accountability that have characterised the operations of telecom companies in the country in recent years.
According to Akpabio, it has become morally wrong, economically unjust and socially unacceptable for telecom operators who make billions of naira in profits every year to continue to charge Nigerians for services that were never rendered, calls that never connected, conversations that were abruptly terminated and data that disappears mysteriously without any satisfactory explanation to the subscribers who paid for them.
Following deliberations on a motion of urgent national importance concerning the protection of telecom consumers and the need to ensure value for money in the telecommunications sector, the Senate unanimously resolved to mandate its Committee on Communications to conduct a comprehensive, thorough and far-reaching investigation into the complaints and report back with actionable solutions.
The resolution of the Red Chamber specifically directed the Committee on Communications to summon and invite the Nigerian Communications Commission, NCC, which is the apex regulatory body for the telecommunications industry, as well as all major network operators including MTN Nigeria, Airtel Nigeria, Globacom Nigeria Limited and T2, formerly known as 9mobile, to appear before it to answer questions.
The Senate said the Committee must critically examine and interrogate the worrisome practice of deducting subscribers’ airtime for failed calls, unconnected calls and calls that are prematurely terminated within seconds, a situation that has become so rampant that many Nigerians have lost count of how much money they have lost to such deductions in the last few months alone.
In addition to the issue of failed and dropped calls, the Senate also directed the Committee to establish, quantify and document the total financial losses that Nigerian subscribers have suffered over the years as a result of illegal deductions, unsolicited caller tunes, unwanted value-added services, unexplained data depletion and other forms of dubious charges that subscribers never subscribed to.
Presiding over the plenary, Senator Akpabio stated that the Senate could no longer fold its arms, look the other way and pretend that all is well in the telecom sector when millions of Nigerians are crying out daily over the poor services being rendered to them, despite the fact that telecommunications has become an indispensable part of daily life and economic survival for most citizens.
He pointed out that for the average Nigerian trader in Onitsha Main Market, Alaba International Market or Computer Village, for students who depend on the internet for academic research and online examinations, for families trying to stay in touch with loved ones and for small businesses that rely on phone calls and data for transactions, every single naira deducted unjustly has a significant impact on their livelihood.
The Senate President emphasized that the National Assembly, as the representatives of the people, has a constitutional duty and moral obligation to protect consumers, ensure accountability in the delivery of essential public services and ensure that regulatory agencies like the NCC do not abdicate their responsibility of protecting the interests of subscribers while pandering to the interests of powerful operators.
He assured Nigerians that the Senate will treat the matter with the seriousness, urgency and importance it deserves, adding that the Committee on Communications has been given a strict deadline of four weeks to conclude its investigation, engage all relevant stakeholders, gather empirical evidence, analyse billing systems and submit a detailed report with far-reaching recommendations for legislative and regulatory action.
According to Akpabio, the recommendations expected from the Committee may include, but not limited to, amendment of the Nigerian Communications Act to provide stiffer penalties for poor service delivery, introduction of new consumer protection regulations, imposition of heavy fines on operators who fail to meet quality of service standards and introduction of mandatory compensation for subscribers.
He said such compensation could be in the form of automatic refund of airtime deducted for failed and dropped calls, free bonus airtime, free data bundles or extension of validity period for subscribers who suffer network disruptions, as is the practice in many advanced countries where consumer rights are taken seriously and operators are held accountable for every second of service failure.
During the debate that preceded the resolution, several Senators took turns to narrate their personal experiences and those of their constituents, lamenting that Nigerians are being forced to pay for inefficiency, with many subscribers complaining that they are charged full call rates for calls that never connected, calls that lasted less than five seconds and calls marred by heavy echoing, breaking and inaudible voices.
They also expressed deep concern over the rising cases of unexplained airtime deductions, where subscribers wake up in the morning only to discover that their airtime balance has been wiped out overnight without making any call or browsing the internet, a development that has led to widespread suspicion that some operators have deliberately programmed their billing systems to steal customers’ money.
Other lawmakers raised the alarm over the issue of rapid and inexplicable data depletion, where a data bundle of 10 gigabytes that should ordinarily last a subscriber for one month gets exhausted within two or three days without any corresponding heavy usage, thereby forcing subscribers to spend more money to repurchase data and making internet access in Nigeria one of the most expensive in the world.
They argued that it is unfair and exploitative for telecom operators in Nigeria to be declaring billions of naira in profits and repatriating huge foreign exchange to their parent companies abroad, while Nigerian subscribers who provide the revenue are left with epileptic, frustrating and substandard services, with no compensation, no apology, no explanation and no effective channel for redress or refund.
The Senate observed that in other countries such as South Africa, Ghana, Kenya, the United Kingdom and the United States, telecom operators are compelled by strong, effective and consumer-friendly regulations to compensate subscribers for every dropped call, failed call and poor service, with some operators automatically crediting subscribers with free minutes, free data or airtime refunds whenever there is network downtime.
In contrast, the Upper Chamber noted, Nigerian subscribers are left to bear the losses alone, to suffer in silence and to keep paying for services not rendered, without any form of compensation, protection or sympathy from either the operators or the regulator, a situation that has emboldened the operators to continue with poor service delivery knowing that there will be no serious consequences for their actions.
The Senate Committee on Communications, which is chaired by Senator Aliyu Ikrah Bilbis from Zamfara State, is now expected to swing into action immediately by inviting the Executive Vice Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of the NCC, Dr Aminu Maida, as well as the Managing Directors and Chief Executive Officers of MTN, Airtel, Globacom and T2, to appear before it with detailed records and explanations.
The Committee is expected to demand from the operators and the regulator detailed records of customer complaints in the last two years, their billing and charging systems, call data records, quality of service reports, compensation policies, as well as evidence of refunds made to subscribers for failed and dropped calls, if any, in order to determine the veracity of the complaints and the culpability of the operators.
In addition to the operators and the NCC, the Committee is also expected to invite and engage with consumer protection advocacy groups, the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission, FCCPC, the National Association of Telecom Subscribers, NATCOMS, civil society organisations and ordinary Nigerians who have suffered financial losses, to get first-hand testimonies of the exploitation and its impact.
Meanwhile, stakeholders in the telecommunications sector, including subscribers, consumer rights activists and industry analysts, have commended the Senate for its timely intervention, describing it as a bold, patriotic and long-overdue step towards protecting the rights of over 220 million active telephone subscribers in Nigeria who have for years cried out against poor service and exploitation without any meaningful response.
