Christopher Isiguzo in Enugu

The Nigerian Communications Commission, (NCC), on Friday in Enugu vowed to clampdown on telecom providers who still issue unregistered mobile telephone sim cards to subscribers, as it had commenced investigation into the discovery.

The Commission said it had thought such trend no longer existed until recently when it was brought to the notice of some of its officials about the unethical practice.

Chairman of the Governing Board of NCC, Senator Olabiyi Durojaiye, made the disclosure at the commission’s South East Sensitisation workshop on the code of Corporate Governance in Enugu, yesterday.

Durojaiye said: “Only three day ago, pressmen in Abuja confronted me with the allegation that some telecom service providers still indulge in allowing unregistered sim cards to remain in circulation.

“I have immediately requested the management of NCC to step into prompt investigation so we can take appropriate remedial/punitive actions.”

Executive Vice Chairman of NCC, Prof. Umar Dambata, at the workshop, also disclosed that evaluation report of the state of the industry suggested that most challenges negatively impacting operators in the sector were attributable to poor governance issues.

Dambata noted that it was for such shortcomings that the commission was sensitising stakeholders in the telecom industry on the code of corporate governance.

According to Dambata, the sensitisation was to draw attention to the adopted international best practices and principles as mandatory baselines in the communication industry.

He stated that it was found out that countries with good corporate governance culture attracted and retained higher quality of investment and capital flow and reduce operational cost in the medium to long term.

The NCC chairman also corroborated that the commission had been having serious issues with operators on the integrity of SIM registration data generated by operators and their agents under the SIM registration.

“These challenges emanate from state of our corporate governance practices which this workshop and the code are intended to sensitise us about,” Dambata said.

SOURCE