ATCON outlines conditions for sale of NITEL, wants NCA reviewed

Ahead of this year’s international conference and exhibition, ComBIT-09, by the umbrella body of registered telecommunications firms in the country, under the aegis of Association of Telecommunications Companies of Nigeria (ATCON), the group has outlined conditions to facilitate eventual successful disposing of the first national operator, the Nigerian Telecommunications Plc (NITEL) and M-Tel, the subsidiary.

  This is coming as ATCON also called for immediate review of the Nigerian Communications Act (NCA) of 2003, so as to avoid the kind of controversy recently generated by the 2.3 Gega Hertz sale in the country.

  According to ATCON president, Dr. Emmanuel Ekuwem, the plans to sell NITEL within 60-day time frame as ordered by the Federal Government is welcome, but there is need to also recommend that the Bureau for Public Enterprise (BPE) come up with a time-table for the implementation of any proposal by the potential winner of the NITEL bid.

  ATCON outline included that a time frame must be given to the would-be buyer within which to turn the fortunes of NITEL around.

  The content of this fortunes turn around, he said, must be clearly stated in the purchase agreement to include roll out, number reactivated fixed line telephone exchanges per month, new broadband infrastructure installations per month among other.

  “In other words, there must be a time-table for the fortune turn-around,” he said, stressing that a private monopoly must not be created from NITEL that was a public monopoly.

  “If a public monopoly is insensitive, slow to introduce new technologies, can dictate prices without commensurate high quality of service, can embark on anti-competitive and anti-trust activities, can emasculate, engulfs or edge out smaller companies, a private monopoly will be worse in the same practices,” he noted.

  As said by him, small companies are by their very nature very creative and innovative while the big ones are reluctant to introduce new technologies and innovations; especially when the innovation will entail updating and upgrading of infrastructure.

  “We cannot afford to stifle the continued growth of the industry by acts of institutionalized discouragement of the smaller companies,” he said.

  Additionally, ATCON said that national security must be paramount in the conducting due diligence on the would-be buyers.

  “No non-Nigerian company must have an undue or excessive access to and control of our national knowledge pipes. By Nigerian we mean companies whose ownership, political roots and techno-managerial anchors, research and development to name a few are Nigerians,” the group.

  They further canvassed for the review of the Nigerian Communications Act (NCA) of 2003.

  “A palpable fallout of the 2.3 GHz controversy was the need for certain provisions of the NCA to be stated much more clearly,” the group said, pointing out that grey areas should be avoided as much as possible.

  “T’s should be crossed and i’s dotted. This is the best time for this review as the current board of NCC will be completing its term sometime next year. The review should be completed before the next board takes office,” he said, noting that in that manner, neither the outgoing board nor the incoming one will feel witch-hunted.

  “We, therefore, call on the relevant committees of the National Assembly to convene the much awaited Public Hearing on the NCA,” he said.

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