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MTN, Etisalat, others frustrate criminal investigations – Police

By on July 23, 2013

Some of the criminal investigations carried out by the police suffer setback because of the refusal of some major telecommunications companies in the country to cooperate with security agents, Daily Independent has learnt.

A senior police officer at the Federal Anti-robbery Squad (FEDSARS) at Adeniji Adele in the Lagos Island Local Government area of Lagos State, who pleaded anonymity, disclosed this during an exclusive interview with Daily Independent.

He also added that some of the investigations take more time because some telecommunications firms would not supply security agents the necessary information that could facilitate investigation.

“You raid a suspected armed robbers’ hide-out and, may be, recover mobile phones with SIM cards; you now approach the telecommunications company for assistance, but they turn you down, so in that case what do you do?”

The police chief, who was reacting to the rampant cases of kidnapping in Lagos, stressed that the menace would have been stamped out “if companies like MTN and Etisalat would jettison unnecessary protocol and hard-line position and join hands with the law enforcement agents in fighting the crime.”

He stated that the recent case of kidnap of a Chinese national suffered this fate, as MTN refused to oblige investigators access to the call logs of the suspected criminals which would have made it easy for the police to locate the position of the criminals and the victim.

“When we went to the MTN, they refused to give us the call logs. Meanwhile, the kidnappers were using MTN number to communicate with the relatives of the victim, but MTN insisted we have to get court order to be able to enter into their system, that is not good enough.”

Similarly, Commissioner of Police, Special Fraud Unit, (SFU), Tunde Ogunsakin, also said his investigations of some high profile fraud cases suffered similar fate in the hands of some telecommunications companies, “especially Etisalat.”

He said the department has officially complained to the Nigerian Telecommunications Commission (NCC) to prevail on the concerned telecommunications companies to see reason and assist security operatives in the discharge of their duties.

The police boss added that “it was when operatives threatened to arrest officials of Etisalat as accomplice in the crime that they reluctantly supplied the police with the information that were needed for the investigation.”

He solicited the cooperation of the telecoms firm in the fight against crime in the country.

But when contacted, General Manager, Corporate Affairs of the MTN Nigeria, Funmi Omogbenigun, said the Inspector General (IG) of Police had approved a process for the release of Call Data Recording system (CDRs) to the Nigeria Police.

“I can assure you that MTN is fully compliant and has been very supportive of the security agencies in the pursuit of their statutory responsibilities,” Omogbenigun added.

She insisted that the MTN provides the requisite assistance to aid the police in the discharge of their duties and has as a result received several commendations from the Nigeria Police Force.

“We do not require a sworn affidavit from members of the NPF,” she said.

All efforts to get the Etisalat management’s reaction to the police allegation up to press time last night failed to yield result.

 

 

[Daily Independent]