The Senate, Nigeria’s upper legislative arm has said that the approach of payment of the N4 billion compensation to Nigerian subscribers for poor services rendered by GSM operators was unacceptable.
Chief Sylvester Anyanwu, chairman, Senate committee on Communications, described the arrangement as arrant nonsense, unacceptable and another calculated attempt to further insult the collective intelligence of citizens of this country.
"We had instructed NCC on what to do. We asked the telecoms firms to pay subscribers handsomely for poor quality service. Now we are in the month of May and this compensation ought to have been paid since January, yet, they are telling us that they want to start paying by July and not only that but in batches. I am indeed sorry, the arrangement is not okay by us. What we want them to know is that they must pay it now. Any further postponement will not be entertained". He added.
Anyanwu said the service providers have been evading culpability for the poor quality of service from January to July, if their compensation arrangement is anything to go by.
According to him, the companies were supposed to have credited each subscriber with a minimum of N175 airtime but the committee considered this to be too small and insultive, stressing that the compensation does not reflect the kind of money the companies are making out of the poor quality of service being rendered.
He said that "This time around, NCC must live up to its expectations, otherwise we will be compelled to look at quality of service from July and this quarter and apply the necessary sanctions because the quality of service is getting worse, especially for MTN".