NCC Sees Telecommunication as Fundamental Human Right
Stories by Emma Okonji The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) the telecoms regulatory body, has reiterated the declaration of the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), that telecommunication is a fundamental right of everyone. ITU is the United Nation agency responsible for global coordination of telecoms operations.
At a recent forum hosted by the NCC to enlighten telecommunications subscribers about how to enjoy the new life that has come with mobile telecommunication revolution in Nigeria, the communion insisted that subscribers must see telecommunication as their fundamental human right.
At the form, Director of Public Affairs at NCC, Mr. Tony Ojobo, declared to participants that NCC was working hard to help Nigerians enjoy that right along with other citizens of the world.
According to Ojobo, “Basically, what we do is to create the enabling environment for telecommunications to grow to be able to provide access. The International Telecommunications Union has indicated that telecommunications has now become a fundamental human right. This means that wherever you are, you should have access.”
“When we talk about universal access, we are talking about access to telecommunications within five kilometre radius. So our mandate is to ensure there is access to telecommunications for all Nigerians,” Ojobo said.
He explained that the NCC has also set quality of standards, and would continue to ensure compliance to those standards and impose penalties, where such standards are breached.
He added, “When we talk about telecommunications, people talk about the regular voice communications but it goes beyond that to data communications. Now data communication has become key to our lives. When you are talking about data communications, we are talking about even the alert you get from your bank when somebody pays money into another person’s account. It also includes the emails, the Whatapps and the text messages.”
He said data also includes the transactions made on the Automated Teller Machine (ATM) as well as other communications carried out on the Point of Sales (POS) terminals.
“All of these are services riding on telecommunications. Essentially, what we are saying is that telecommunication is life and it has affected the way we live daily,” Ojobo said.
He said in recognition of the fundamentality of telecommunications to the lives of the people, the Nigerian government has been providing the enabling environment for networks to expand, even as it continues to push the frontiers for the expansion of data communication which government sees as the present and the future of telecommunications.
“As at today, teledensity is 100.45 per cent. And we have 81 million internet users. As at our last statistics in February, 81 million Nigerians are on the internet. We have 145 million active subscribers. That gives an indication of the size of the industry. In other words, our action or inaction affects 145 million subscribers,” Ojobo said.
“Today, we have people who have their businesses on their laptops or their tablets or their phones. That is their office. All they are doing is from that platform. Their banking transactions are done on the cell phone, the online purchases are done on the cell phone, hotel reservations are done on the cell phone and airline reservations are done on the cell phone. That means that there is a lot of vibrancy on this industry and people are beginning to wonder what would have been happening in Nigeria without the mobile revolution,” Ojobo said, while reiterating that telecommunication has become a fundamental right of the people.
For Ojobo, the bridge to ensuring that service providers do what they pledged and meet the expectation of consumers is anchored on monitoring operators both on the technical and economic fronts.
Also, the Enugu Zonal Controller of NCC, Mr. Abang Lawrence, said subscribers have right to demand and get good quality of service as much as possible.
According to Lawrence, “Telecommunications users have the right to be involved. They have a right to know all the requirements of the services they are getting from the operator.
They have a right to question the quality of services they are receiving. They have a right to a quick response to their complaints.”
Recognising that a man’s rights can be trampled upon by those that are supposed to help him enjoy the right to quality telecommunications services, Lawrence said the regulatory agency had put a process in place for subscribers to seek redress, when the need arises.