Telecoms Executives Tackle NCC Over Lingering Industry Issues

At the 2014 Telecoms Executive Forum organised annually by the Association of the Telecommunications Companies of Nigeria (ATCON), top executives of telecos tackled the head of the Nigerian Communications Commission NCC over lingering industry issues but he seems not to agree with some issues raised by the telecos executives writes Isaiah Erhiawarien.

There was a mixed reaction recently at the annual Telecoms Executive Forum organised by the Association of the Telecommunications Companies of Nigeria (ATCON) as telecos and mobile telephone services operators made frantic efforts to get the industry regulator, Nigerian Communications Commission to address grey areas that they consider unfriendly to the business environment.

Tagged: Telecoms Executive and Regulator 2014, the forum was cleverly designed to address issues that have repeatedly formed subject of discussion among stakeholders and executive chat among top echelons of the industry during their private discussions.

Although there were other issues penciled down for discussion

according to the President of ATCON, Engr. Lanre Ajayi in his opening remark, what however got the fancy of the executives present  were the issues of Infraco juxtapose the Open Access Model, the unending cry over local content and the grievances of stakeholders over the spectrum license auction.

Panel discussions were therefore setup to discuss each of the issues while the participants were later allowed to ask questions which the Executive Vice Chairman of the Commission, Dr. Eugene Juwah who beat all odds to be personally available at the Forum was required to respond to.

Juwah had earlier in his keynote address to the telecos executive described the event as very crucial to the growth of the industry thereby giving the participants the leeway to bare their minds on all issues.

The first panel of discussion, which was on corporate governance in the industry, was chaired by the Country Manager, Ceregon Network, Mr. Tadesse Bekele.

Bekele in his opening remarks expressed optimism that about the essence of the forum saying that it is an opportunity for the telecoms executive to rub minds with the leadership of the NCC adding that if the proposed Infraco is properly executed it will fulfilled the broadband policy objectives of the Federal Government.

At the end of each panel discussion, through which the panelist dwell  on issues of concerning the proposed Infraco, Spectrum allocation, corporate governance as well as the open model access and the participants were allowed to ask questions and comment issues raised by the panelist.

Responding to one of the question that relates to competence, Juwah observed that although he does not work for the operator yet his experience as the EVC has showed that there is a lot of display of incompetence on the side of most of the Nigerian companies.

According to him, some companies are good in executing projects but some well known Nigerian companies believe they can collect money and not deliver on the project adding that the issue became so bad that it had to be reported to security agencies.

He said that was done to avoid a situation where people will think that it is the NCC that embezzled the money saying that “when we are clamouring to do a project we must executive them. We are a government department, if we give you a project you must do it and if you do not do it we will not pay you.”

He said there is still a lot of lack of incompetence in the industry noting that telecos and operators should “develop a culture of completing projects and not just to collect money and run away.”

On the need for the NCC to intervene for the industry to be able to generate employment by limiting the effect of capitalisation on the growth of Nigerian- owned telecos, he said there are clear facts that the industry is not well capitalised stressing that that was reason for the collapse of the CDMA sector.

According to him, they all borrowed a lot of money from the banks and they were unable to pay back stating that that is why the industry needs foreigners to bring in companies that are well capitalised to do the major work while Nigerian companies ride on their infrastructure.

He however, observed that Nigerians are currently winners in wholesale license and service provision license saying that “in our restructuring of the value added services we hope that a lot of Nigerians who are creative and innovative can create applications that can ride on the facilities of the incumbent service providers under strict regulations.”

On the need for local companies to partner with foreign telecos, he said, “if you read our catalogue for on the Infraco license it connotes that a partnership with a Nigerian company is necessary. You cannot do these things without having a Nigerian company.”

He said that to take part in such a complicated bid partnership with a Nigerian company is needed adding however that the law of Nigeria permits hundred percent ownership saying that it is an issue that is political apart from being social-economic.

While calling on ATCON to raise the issue with the appropriate authority he said there are very few foreigners in the industry.

He explained that as big as MTN is today, it is managed by Nigerians saying that “there are very few foreigners and you cannot rule out zero level presence of foreigners but the fact remains that most telecos are owned by Nigerians.”

He said further that the issue of labour in the industry does not fall under purvey of the NCC saying that Ministry of Labour and Productivity is responsible for that and that the NCC will follow the NCC Act to the latter.

In his responds to the EVC, President of ATCON noted that the agitations of local telecos is that what has been done in the oil and gas industry should be replicated in the telecoms industry saying that the telecos wants grant from government so that they can manufacture most of the hardware of the industry in Nigeria thereby creating jobs for the citizens.

Similarly, Director of Regulatory Affairs, Vodacom, Mrs. Nkechi Newton-Denila said that the demand for Spectrum was as result of the demand for wireless connection and the discussion around it noting that when discussion began at NCC forum, focus seems to be on releasing more spectrum into the market and making national transmission available.

She noted that what the NCC needs to look at was the existing spectrum that has been assigned to operators explaining that “this is a scarce resource, and each time there is a new spectrum opened it can only go to a few parties. And what should happen is that there should actually be a holistic view in terms of how we can provide and ensure effective utilisation of spectrum that will enable users to have access to broadband and proper quality services as well as very good prices especially at the hinterland.”

According to her, “the only way that can happened is if the NCC makes a commitment to provide incentives” saying that “in the last eight years we have been paying the same thing for spectrum, which takes large chunk of the cost of sales.”

She added, “Even that cost is not added when you are calculating the cost of sales and bandwidth charges noting that “for smaller companies like us that is quite a lot of money. If we have to be sustained in the market that is a double problem.”

Newton-Denila while calling the NCC to review the cost of spectrum said that the effort of providing more spectrum to increase access to broadband at a low price will not be complete if the price of the spectrum allocation is high noting that in the last two years the cost of international capacity has come down to about 150 per cent because the international market is responding to the forces of supply.

She said further that since spectrum is scarce, the only way for prices to come down is only if there is a decision from the government that here is what we are giving to support the operators to make the prices of broadband to land at the end user point at a reasonable price.

She urged the NCC to show commitment to bring down the prices of spectrum saying that not having a revision at all for the past eight years is not good for the industry survival and the objectives of the national broadband policy initiated by the current leadership of the Ministry of Communications Technology and with full support of the Federal Government.

But the EVC of the NCC in his response said that auctioning is not compulsory for those who think they cannot afford it saying that nobody is forcing anyone to pay for it.

According to him, “you pay what you feel is the value of the spectrum and that is why we auction 2.3GHz. We are going to auction 2.7GHz soon. Prices have been the same in the last eight years. In fact there is no prices that has remained the same in the last eight years, prices have increased but we are not planning to increase price otherwise there would be uproar in the industry.”

Juwah told the telecoms executive that telecoms is not for small players saying that you must get ready and be capable unless there is no way you can compete.