Vandalization as an act before now was synonymous with the oil and gas sector of the country’s economy, where petroleum pipe lines are vandalized with the aim of siphoning petroleum products from the pipes.

This nefarious act has led to loss of human lives and material wealth over the years especially in recent years when the product has become goldmine. The growth of telecommunications in the country as witnessed in the spread of coverage by Global System for Mobile (GSM) communications saw this ‘bad word’ extending its tentacle to the sector that has been adjudged the fastest in terms of growth in Africa. It started as activities of areas boys who demanded for settlement from telecom operators before they could site their base stations in their areas and has today, grown to menacing proportions.

When last year, Nigeria witnessed its worst quality of service issue in GSM service delivery that led to Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) slamming blanket ban on MTN and Zain from running promo and directed that they pay compensation to their subscribers; the operators argued that they were not responsible for the poor quality of service attributing it to vandalization and theft of their equipment.

This argument was not acceptable; maybe NCC and National Assembly saw it as an afterthought as such issue was not raised before the hammer fell on them. But, today, the matter that was relegated to the background has turned out to be a subject for discussion by the industry stakeholders.

NCC few weeks ago organized Stakeholders’ Forum to tackle vandalization and theft of telecom infrastructure where it resolved to collaborate with security agencies to address the issue. Engr. Ernest Ndukwe, executive vice chairman, NCC said at the forum that there was need for the commission to revisit the military decree that punished culprits of theft and vandalization of Nitel and government properties with long term imprisonment of 21 years.

This forum has been described by industry stakeholders as timely, when after one year of sanctions, operators are yet to deliver improved quality of service on their networks; and also proved that capacity is not the sole responsibility for poor quality of service.

Impact on operators

MTN Nigeria said it lost N125.2 million worth of equipment to theft and vandalization within 11 months of 2007. According to Mr. Karl Toriola, chief technical officer, MTN, 90 generating sets worth N44 million and 654,214 litres of diesel worth N65,421 million, were stolen within the period.

Others include 35 solenoid worth N2.7 million, 23 air conditioners worth N1.3 million, 47 batteries worth N2.1 million and 120 AVR put at N9.7 million. He added that vandalization of about 300 sites and sabotage of MTN’s transmission infrastructure led to significant downtime last year. These figures may have doubled going by increase activities of these vandals and thieves.

Toriola noted that repeated and multiple cuts to its fibre optic network disrupt service, defeat redundancy and self healing architecture of fibre rings as damage to one microwave tower will often affect several others in line of sight causing widespread transmission outages. "Increasing community agitation and militancy across the six geographical zones with greatest incidence in Lagos, Niger-Delta, South-East also affected our services," he said.

According to him, about 50 sites were rendered inaccessible per day on account of community issues. He added that increasing robbery and banditry hamper the ability to provide reactive maintenance within preferred best practice response times. Zain on the other hand lost 100 generators last year which has doubled as at last month when Mr. Bayo Ligali, chief executive officer of the company disclosed that GSM operators are losing at least two sets of generators to thieves on daily basis. Although Globacom has not disclosed the number of its generators and other equipments lost to vandalism and theft, it is believed that it could still be in the same range with its competitors as they are not operating in a different environment. However, these thieves overpower security guards guiding these base stations with sophisticated weapon to carry out their unscrupulous act.

Nigeria CommunicationsWeek gathered that 3 GSM operators had a total of 11,900 base stations as at the end of July this year. A breakdown of which shows that MTN has 4,200, Glomobile 4,100 and Zain 3,600 with installed 23,800 generators. GSM operators are using generating sets because of the unreliable nature of Nigeria’s public power supply.

Mr. Ligali said that apart from countries where they have witnessed wars and other major conflicts, Nigeria ranks highest among countries that have recorded rampant vandalization of telecommunications equipment in the world.

Options

Nigeria cannot afford to allow few disgruntled elements destroy the growth recorded in an industry she seem to have gotten it right among others in the economy. Against this backdrop, something needs to be done fast to check this ugly trend capable of throwing us back to the dark ages of telecommunications.

Mr. Gbenga Adebayo, chairman, Association of Telecommunications Operators of Nigeria (Alton) suggested that the Federal Government should present a bill to the National Assembly, to advance a law that will stipulate stiffer penalties of up to 10 years imprisonment for apprehended vandals of base stations and other infrastructure like optic fibre cables.

According to Adebayo, Alton was actually at the forefront of the plans to sponsor the bill at the National Assembly, even as he expressed optimism that having been a problem that affects all, the bill would not have much problem being passed into law.

He cited the scenario of the 80s when it was a serious offence punishable by a long stretch of prison sentence, to vandalize Nitel property and wondered why the same protection is not extended to today’s telecom operators who are largely private firms.

He said his association has over time, articulated and packaged submissions to the Federal Government by writing to relevant agencies, ministries and related authorities over what they have been going through in the hands of vandals and thieves who steal and damage facilities, and the need to be given some kind of protection to enable them focus on delivering better quality of service to the subscribers.

"We cannot fold our arms and watch things continue the way they are going," he said.

Adebayo cautioned that with the astronomical growth of telecom subscribers on the networks, government should at least provide those basic things to help the operators in providing quality and seamless services or risk having the networks collapse with inestimable drastic effects on the economy of the country.

Franchising option should be also looked into by operators to address this menace especially in rural areas, just as Zain’s Rural Acquisition Initiative (RAI). Franchising is a method of doing business where a franchisor licenses trademarks to a franchisee in exchange for a recurring payment – usually a percentage of gross profits as well as the annual fees.

Zain’s RAI is targeted at low income consumers in most rural and poorest parts of Nigeria. The telecom franchise programme initiative is designed to involve rural residents in base station management and distribution programme, creating jobs, wealth, and improved products and services availability in the process.

Franchisees selected for the programme are the drivers of the programme as local entrepreneurs and in turn recruit representatives from their locality to sell services and protect local base stations in their areas. They are given necessary technical, marketing, sales and financial support by Zain to help grow their businesses.

Fola Odufuwa, founder of eShekels limited, a pioneer ICT researcher in Sub-Saharan Africa, said franchising has ability to speedily start a new business based on a proven template. It also ensures expansion of operations more rapidly.

According to him, Nigerian entrepreneurs do not really need subsidies but a level playing field, access to capital and fair access to existing networks, adequate profit sharing structure and legal protection for their investments.

Business franchising involves the transfer of the total way of doing business that has been developed by a franchisor (big enterprise) to a franchisee (such as small and medium enterprise).

In the context of telecoms, it means that the service provider transfers to the small entrepreneur, the whole process including technical expertise, training systems, marketing, management methods and relevant information on provision of telecoms services to rural areas for an agreed fee or proportion of profit on the business.

Industry analysts say franchising can to an extent, assist in curbing theft and vandalization of telecomm equipment. For instance, if operators franchise their base stations, products and distribution outlets in a community to an indigene of such community, chances are that such franchisee will provide adequate security for those equipments knowing fully well that he or she has stakes in the business and if anything happens to the equipment, he stands to lose money. More so, his people will see such equipments as belonging to a local and not the major network operator and then be more willing to protect them.