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Inactive operators control 727,147 telephone lines

By on August 1, 2014

Telecommunications operators who had been declared inactive by the industry regulator, the Nigerian Communications Commission, controlled 727,147 telephone lines as of March 31, investigations have shown.

Although the number of lines controlled by the inactive operators seems insignificant compared to the total 127,097,196 lines as of the date, the significance of the number of lines that must have been rendered inactive can be seen in the fact fixed operators that render special services are mostly affected.

Statistics obtained from the regulatory agency showed that as of March 31, 2014, the total number of lines in the kitty of the fixed operators stood at 172,963 after the 727,147 controlled by the inactive operators had been excluded.

Operators declared inactive include Starcomms Limited, Reliance Telecoms, Intercellular Nigeria Limited, MTS First Communications and Disc Communications.

Others are WiTEL, Odua Telecom, Rainbownet Limited, Monarch Communications, XS Broadband, Webcom as well as the Nigerian Telecommunications Limited and its mobile subsidiary, the Nigerian Mobile Telecommunications Limited.

Apart from M-Tel, all the inactive operators are fixed telephony firms. For many years, NITEL was the major provider of fixed services in the country.

Aside from M-Tel, the inactive operators controlled 468,627 lines. This means that the proportion of fixed lines to the fixed lines controlled by the inactive operators stood at 36.91 per cent.

Among the inactive operators, four controlled the largest numbers. These were NITEL, 58,750 lines; Starcomms, 180,235; Reltel, 111,077; and O’net, 35,421.

As of March 2012, the fixed CDMA operators controlled 4,033,661 lines, with Starcomms having 725, 871; Visafone, 2,495,790; Multilinks, 680,960; and Reliance Telecoms, 111,077.

A number of factors account for the declining fortunes of the fixed operators. These include their inability to match the competitive edge and financial backbone of the GSM operators; subscribers’ perception; limited CDMA handsets in the Nigerian market; and the general high churn rate in the telecommunications industry.

 

 

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