Nigeria: Active Telephone Lines Hit 116mil

Nigeria had 450,000 active line as at 2001, the NCC said.
The Nigerian Communications Commission
(NCC) on Friday said active telephone lines in
the country had increased from 450,000 to 116
million from 1960 to 2013.
Tony Ojobo, Director, Public Affairs of the
Commission, told the News Agency of Nigeria in
Abuja that the lines were mostly of the Global
System Mobile Communication (GSM) stock.
He said that the commission recorded 450,000
connected lines from 1960 to 2001 for a
population of about 100 million and recorded
116 million connected lines from 2001 to 2013.
Mr. Ojobo said that the country had suffered
from monopoly in telecommunication, adding
that the situation was driven by profit objectives
because there was no competition. He said the
increase recorded in the connected lines is
because the sector is currently opened up to
competition with the licensing of the digital
service providers.
Speaking on the ongoing competition among the
telecom providers through advertisements, Mr.
Ojobo said the launch of Mobile Number
Portability (MNP) had increased the
competition. He noted that the essence of
competition was to provide opportunity for
choice, better tariff plans as well as to provide
better services and value for money.
"Mobile number portability has deepened
competition. I don't know what makes
competition unhealthy.
"Now every network is fighting for the market
for mobile communication in Nigeria; so, what
you see playing out now is that struggle for
dominance in the market.
"Who is the best network, who has better tariff
plan, better package and better consumer
service? Competition might not be friendly but
could be healthy,'' Mr. Ojobo said.
He said that it had got to the commission that
some people were raising issues of ethics as
regard to adverts ran by network providers. He
said that all issues related to advertisement
should be left for the Advertising Practitioners of
Nigeria to handle.
"What NCC is concerned with is to ensure that
consumers have value for their money. If what is
happening is going to give value to the
consumers, then fine," he said.
Mr. Ojobo advised people to look beyond the
advertisement and focus on the value MNP
would bring saying MNP was beginning to do
something new in the advertisement market. He
said that number portability was strengthening
the advertisement companies and also making
them to be more creative and innovative.
He said it was also making the models being
used for the advertisement to be better-
appreciated and get better bargain in terms of
how much they were being paid.
"I believe that advert people are not complaining
about it, I think it may be innovational creativity.
I can't speak for the parties involved but I
believe that these companies would have looked
at the rules and regulations to see whether they
were doing anything unethical.
"They must have done their home work but what
this is showing is that the telecommunication
market is matured, developing as well as the
advertising companies," he said.
Mr. Ojobo said that had shown that
telecommunication services were providing a lot
of revenue for advertising companies and
additional value to the Nigerian models. He said
that MNP would make the networks more
respectful and responsible to their subscribers,
thereby making the consumer a king.