Telecom
50 Hearty Cheers to Telecom Consumer Parliament
It seems like yesterday when the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) begun the Telecom Consumer Parliament, Telecom, an alternative dispute resolution mechanism (ADR).
Like in all the previous editions, the 50th sitting of the Parliament in Abuja brought together the regulator, major telecoms operators in the country, consumers and consumers’ rights groups under one roof to chart a progressive course for the industry.
Issues pertaining, to Quality of Service, Consumer Rights Protection, Environmental Impact Assessment, Interconnection, Tariffs and Universal Service Provision were discussed at the meeting.
The 50th sitting is a toast to the Parliament which for the first time, consumers of telecommunications services and the providers agree that the alternative dispute resolution system set up in August 2003 by the NCC has worked.
Ernest Ndukwe, executive vice chairman, NCC said that the Commission has put in place special structures to ensure that the needs and desires of the consumer are taken care of.
“For us in the Commission, the consumer is the main object, the subject and the reason for our being; hence the place of the Consumer as the king is sacrosanct” he said
He also spared words for the operators which he said belong to a class of stakeholders in the business of telecom regulation.
He said that “Apart from obtaining their operational licenses, with certain obligations attached to them, the operators also expect certain obligations from government and the regulator. They expect a non partial regulator to protect their huge investments. They want the Commission to ensure that no other entity interferes with their network resources such as frequency spectrum or base stations”
In the Beginning
Many Nigerians believe that the great telecom revolution in Nigeria is the second independence for Nigeria, considering the ample opportunities it offers and the ability it offers for stress- free communication.
But memories are sometimes short and failing. So some Nigerians are quick to forget the dark years of telecommunications in the country characterized by poor services, long waiting period to get a phone line and general decay in infrastructure.
Today, cell phones ring in almost every pocket. Ownership cut across every age, class and boundaries, unlike the past when Nigerians were told phones were not for the poor.
And to attest to the burgeoning revolution, the world stood still and applauded Nigeria at the just ended Mobile World Congress (GSMA) held in Barcelona.
The revolution comes with its challenges, especially with the fragile relationship between consumers and the service providers.
Some of the issues which often get complained of by telecom consumers in Nigeria includes, false billing, arbitrary disconnection of service, poor service delivery, drop calls, non-chalant attitude towards genuine complaints, supply and installation of substandard equipment and devices, deceptive advertisement, credit depletion, inability to recharge, inability to check credit balance, network failure, sending/charging for multiple text massages in place of a single one
The problems are actually caused by power supply problems, network planning, system inadequacies, charging policy.
The increase in such complaints by the subscribers led to the intervention by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) to create a parliament that brings together, stakeholders with the aim of strategising for better services.
The forum is called NCC Telecom Consumer Parliament. It stands on the tripod of the regulator, operators and consumers.
The Parliament
The parliament is the initiative of the Consumer Affairs Bureau (CAB) of Nigerian Communications Commission, established in September 2001, to inform, educate and protect the consumers of telecommunications services in Nigeria.
The Consumer Protection & Advocacy is one of the units of the CAB that is charged with the responsibility of responding to consumer complaints and enquiries.
It has worked and this is the general consensus of critics, consumers and operators.
It has been variously described, but it remains the only frontier that has brought the regulator, operators and subscribers on a round table.
The Parliament serves as a platform for consumer education, an alternative, inexpensive and quick dispute resolution.
It is serves an interactive forum, bridging the gap between operators and consumers in the industry, thereby building confidence and creating mutually beneficial relationship.
The ADR creates a forum for consumers to air their views and suggestions on how to make the industry forward.
It provides reliable feedback to the regulator for effective communications while educating telecom consumer on their rights and obligations for the overall healthy development of the industry.
More importantly it has institutionalized public accountability of both the operators and the regulator while eliciting stakeholders’ views, reactions, and inputs to policies and programmes.
It has also eradicated the perception of the consumers as the underdogs as was the case in the era of monopoly.
How It Works
The Parliament is held monthly at different geographical zones of Nigeria and every Nigerian is free to attend and contribute.
A session of the Parliament begins when the presenter introduces the representatives of the companies, NCC commissioners and management as well as legislators in attendance.
Then the EVC of the NCC is invited to make the opening remarks or give industry report, and after that the presenter spells out the rules of the proceedings including to accord courtesy to one another and that questions and answers be brief, clear and straight to the point.
During the question and answer time, five to 10 questions are taken and representatives of the concerned companies are invited to respond to queries/comments concerning them.
Where the responses provided the EVC intervenes.
At the end of some rounds of questions, the EVC is invited to respond to questions directed at the commission, signaling the end of the session.
The proceedings are recorded in both video and audio. The video is for broadcast in the national television station and in at least one other major TV station.
A report of the session is also prepared by the NCC and lists of all complaints that were brought before the commission are published in the newspapers every year for public accountability.
Achievements
It is easy to lose count of the achievements but a few stands out.
The Parliament was instrumental in bringing down the prices of SIM packs, cutting tarrifs, prices of recharges, extension of validity periojd.
It has also saved operators, consumers, and the regulator the costs, time and resources that would have otherwise gone into lengthy litigations.
The Parliament has presented Nigeria as people with ordered and civilized ways of handling issues.
Thumbs Up
The novel regulatory initiative has earned Nigeria, commendations from International Telecommunications Union (ITU) and ICT professionals and groups across the globe.
ITU is reportedly studying the Nigerian model and hope to replicate it in many countries.
At home, many believe that subscribers are getting the ease with the Consumer Parliament.
Lovithe Eze, a call center operator at Wuse Zone 6, Abuja said that "I have never attended the consumer parliament because I don’t have the time, but from what I have been watching on Television, the forum is important and it assists in telling the operators our problems"
“ I am very sure the consumer parliament has created challenges for operators, and we are seeing the results", said Husaini James, student, 23, who believes that the consumer parliament is a good interaction and should be encouraged.
According to him, sometimes, if you have a problem, even if you call a customer care centre, your problem is not attended to, but in the consumer parliament it is live and direct. "Several times they have no answer to give when customers quiz them at the parliament", he said.
Adeolu Ogunbanjo, president of the National Telecom Subscribers of Nigeria (Natcoms), said the NCC has achieved a lot through the monthly event, adding that a common achievement is the printing and selling of lower or cheaper denominations of recharge cards.
Mr Ogugua Chioke, chairman, GSM Consultative Forum, said the forum is unique and gives opportunities for both the operators and the consumers to interact. According to him, NCC deserves commendation on such excellent initiative and such parliament should be encouraged not only in the telecom sector but in the other sectors. "
Internet Exchange Point of Nigeria is positioning as a regional Internet Exchange hub for West Africa in terms of infrastructure and traffic. Muhammed Rudman, chief executive officer, IXPN, stated this at its 2026 members engagement forum held in Lagos. He noted some of the major milestone IXPN achieved last year to include one terabit of traffic recorded in March 2025.
“At that time, we became the 63rd internet exchange point in the world. Among all the exchanges in Europe and America and in the entire world, we become the number 63 in the world. To achieve that one terabit of traffic. Again, we were able to achieve two terabits of traffic within seven, eight months of the year.
“We achieve this by ensuring that we push for members to upgrade, those that were on 1 Gig to 10 Gig, those on 10 Gig to 100 Gig. We had a strategic infrastructure upgrade across our networks, put 400 Gig enable switches, increase our fiber links to all the data centers and we onboarded 17 new members last year. All the trainings and the operational excellence ensured that our network is up and running 24/7,” he said.
Industry Impact
The impact of that one terabit traffic is data sovereignty. “We were able to domesticate. Based on the survey we conducted, 54% of our members said that they are exchanging 50% of their traffic and above locally, which is really, significant one.
“We are also setting up a benchmark for other African IXPs. I can assure you that in all the community driven internet exchange points in Africa, we are the number one. There’s a community driven internet exchange point in South Africa that was established 10 years before IXPN. There is one in Kenya that was established 6 years before IXPN, but we are way ahead of them when it comes to internet traffic.
“We are also promoting intra African connectivity. As at today, we have customers from Niger, from, Burkina Faso, trying to reach to Nigeria. Recently, we onboarded a very large company in Ivory Coast, to connect to Nigeria.
“Gradually, Nigeria is tilting towards becoming the regional hub for West Africa, where you see Internet Service Providers coming to achieve that. And in terms of the traffic, in 2015 we were at four Gigabits per second. It moves to 21 in 2017 and 52 gigabits per second.
“But by the year 2023 it has reached 540 gigabits. By 2024 we have reached 900 gigabits. But by the end of 2025 we have achieved the two terabits of traffic”.
Network Infrastructure Development
Some of the technical feet IXPN achieved includes, deployment of sFlow; which is a peer to peer traffic analysis. “We’re able to see what members are exchanging between themselves and between the data centers, not the actual content or information, but rather the volume of traffic, and also between our data centers. And based on this, we’re able to do the upgrades.
“We did a multiple link upgrades from 300 Gigabits last year from Digital Realty to Equinix. It was 300 Gig as at the end of 2024, and by 2025, we’ve increased that to 500 gigabits per second. Digital Realty to Rack Center, it was 200 Gigabits per second. We also upgraded that to 500 Gigabits per second.
Open Access Data Centre to Equinix. We’ve upgraded from 20 Gigabits per second to 200 Gigabits per second. We always monitor the ports, and based on that, we increase immediately we reach the threshold of 80%.
“We did an upgrade on the IXP manager. This allows each member to have a login portal to see the traffic they are exchanging and other details, the port as well as to do their own configuration,” he added.
Technical Project Milestones
Microsoft connected cache. “We deployed Microsoft content cache and that has been deployed in Lagos. It was 25 Gigabits per second as of 2024 by 2025 we had to upgrade the infrastructure to 75 Gigabits per second servers, that will be able to accommodate all the Microsoft updates they are doing, exports, download and among others.
“This is part of the content that Microsoft is not providing locally, but we got those servers deployed, and our intention is by next year to see how we can replicate this across the country. Last year, we also deployed the same server in Abuja so that the Abuja people and the Kano people can reach that content without coming back to Lagos.
The Google Global Cache (GGC); “We are hosting all these at IXPN. We also upgraded from 53 Gigabits per second servers in 2024 to 153 Gigabits per second. And this is a huge traffic of YouTube. And as we speak, we are also working towards upgrading those servers,” he explained.
Strategic Partnerships
“We signed an MoU last year between us and an IXP in Senegal, when we went for West African peering forum. A lot of African ISPs are looking to us to see how we can guide them and support them.
“For example, internet exchange point from Gabon, internet exchange point from Rwanda and ISPs in Africa are looking at us as a model to copy, and we tend to support them. We also had a strategic partnership with CIRA, the Canada Internet Registry Association, which is similar to Nira, the Nigerian Internet Registration Association, to have their secondary authoritative servers into Nigeria as an anycast instance. And when they are hosting that, they are hosting other top-level domains as well, like alibaba.info.org.ca, are also hosted with us.
“Since they launched last year, we have seen a traffic of over 1000 DNS responses per second. Presently, there are 13 global root servers in the world, and those 13 servers are the ones that translate your IP address into a domain name. Any website you browse, you put a domain name, it translates into an IP address and its chain of referrals, Nigeria has.ng as a country, called Top Level Domain”.
Earlier in his welcome address, Charles Nmeregini, Business Development Manager, IXPN, said that the members engagement forum is more than an annual country. “Today, we pause to celebrate the milestone, the milestone that we have reached together, the milestone that have bolstered our local traffic exchange, reduce latency and significantly lower the cost of Internet access across the nations and beyond.
“However, today is equally about the horizon. It is a strategic moment as we unveil our 2026 service road map, a forward-looking rubbing designed to deepen interconnection, enhance service delivery and unlock new value across the ecosystem. In an era defined by rapid technological shift, standing still is not an option.
“This forum will spotlight exclusive, strategic business opportunities, new avenues for growth, enhanced pairing capabilities and innovative service model tailored to give your organization a competitive edge. We are not just exchanging data, we are exchanging ideas that will drive the next wave of Nigeria digital economy,” he added.
In today’s rapidly evolving digital landscape, having a trusted and reputable IT partner is no longer optional—it’s essential. Consumers and businesses alike face numerous challenges: buying smartphones, tablets, and laptops that are substandard or incompatible, worrying about device security, and struggling with costly repairs when gadgets break down.
Menxtt NG
This is where Menxtt NG stands out as a true industry leader, providing EU-specification devices, nationwide service, and unmatched support across Nigeria.
As an official BitDefender reseller, Menxtt NG ensures that every device comes fortified with premium cybersecurity solutions. This addresses one of the biggest issues consumers face today: digital threats. With Menxtt NG, customers don’t just get a gadget—they get peace of mind knowing their data and devices are protected.
Beyond security, the company solves a critical problem in tech ownership: the lack of reliable warranties and repair services. Many users find themselves forced to buy new devices due to broken phones, laptops, or tablets.
Menxtt NG addresses this by offering repair services for all major gadgets, saving customers significant money while extending the life of their devices. And for new devices, they provide fully tested EU-spec phones, laptops, and tablets with a 6-month warranty, ensuring both performance and durability.
Accessibility is another barrier Menxtt NG tackles head-on. With free nationwide delivery and a free charging cord included with purchases, they make premium technology available across Nigeria.
Their presence in Ola Ayeni Street, Computer Village, Ikeja, combined with easy contact via 08115919964, 08140902614, 0802 061 1299, 0802 893 1940, +234 916 642 2759, as well as online support at www.menxtt.com.ng and [email protected], ensures convenience for every customer.
Anthony Nwosu, CEO of Menxtt NG, highlights the company’s mission: to deliver top-quality, secure, and durable devices while providing accessible repair and support services.
This comprehensive approach addresses all the pain points consumers face—device quality, security, warranty, and after-sales care—making Menxtt NG more than just a retailer; it’s a reliable IT partner.
In a market flooded with subpar devices and unreliable service, Menxtt NG proves that choosing a reputable IT plug is crucial. With EU-spec devices, nationwide delivery, genuine warranties, and expert repair services, Menxtt NG doesn’t just sell technology—they empower customers to enjoy, protect, and maximize the life of their devices.
Paradigm Initiative (PIN) has strongly condemned Gabon’s ongoing suspension of major social media platforms—Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube—ordered by the Haute Autorité de la Communication (HAAC) on February 17, 2026.
Social Media
NetBlocks and independent monitors confirm widespread disruptions persisting as of February 20, driving users to VPNs amid unstable nationwide connectivity.
PIN described the blanket shutdown as a grave breach of digital rights, including freedom of expression and access to information, silencing discourse during anti-government protests and a labour strike.
The digital rights group highlighted the absence of specific violation evidence, legal basis clarity, or restoration timeline from HAAC, rendering the measure disproportionate.
Gabon’s actions contravene Article 9 of its Constitution, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (Article 19), and African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights (Article 9), failing international legality, necessity, and proportionality tests.
NetBlocks estimates a $2.96 million (FCFA 1.78 billion) Total Cost Impact over two days from WhatsApp, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube outages, crippling entrepreneurs, small businesses, freelancers, journalists, and civil society reliant on these platforms.
The shutdown disrupts commerce, digital payments, customer engagement, and livelihoods—especially youth and informal sectors—in a nation with prior digital curbs during unrest.
PIN urged immediate full platform restoration, HAAC transparency on legal grounds and order details, and ISP notices detailing government directives.
ISPs and tech firms must uphold UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights, ensuring transparency on connectivity orders and avoiding complicity in violations.
This pattern undermines Gabon’s transparency, civic participation, and democratic governance commitments.
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