NCC insists banks must pay USSD debt of N200bn to telcos
By Felicia Nwosu
As the debt owed by financial institutions to telecommunication firms continues to pile up, telecom operators have revealed that the unsettled payment has risen to N200bn being the unsettled payment for Unstructured Supplementary Service Data services.
In an exclusive interview with MARKETING EDGE, Alkasim Umar, Director, Consumer Affairs Bureau, National Communications Commission (NCC), said that the commission has intervened in the matter, insisting that the debt must be paid. He added that there is an ongoing discussion and engagement with concerned stakeholders to ensure the debt is cleared off fully
“We have taken it to a higher level, but it seems the Central Bank of Nigeria ( CBN) is protecting the banks. They even issued a statement that the industry should consider this as a sunk cost, but it is not acceptable to us. Our industry said they must pay this amount, so they are still discussing it.”
“These people have been collecting money but have not been remitting to the operators and it got to a level that they have to report to the regulator because we are their fathers. We have written to CBN and told them there is no way these banks cannot pay. There was a time when we directed the operators to stop offering the services to them, so we have taken various measures and strategies put in place to ensure that this money is paid,” he explained.
The NCC Consumer Affairs Bureau boss reiterated that the regulatory body is committed to ensuring that the debt is paid as the matter, he stressed, has been extended to the CBN.
“We have been having several engagements with the CBN. We are using this engagement to see how this money can be paid to the operators. We cannot just allow them to render services without payment and this is a genuine transaction that happened between them. Why should they just go like this unpaid? It’s not possible,” he said.
Elaborating further on the response of the banks on the matter, he stated that NCC as a regulator cannot solely act on it which is why it has been passed to CBN instead as the financial regulator.
“We don’t have any business with the banks because we are also regulators. We are the government. We have to go to their regulators who are also the government. There is no need for us to sit down with the banks, but a committee was constituted by the CBN, where they selected bankers that are going to be part of the committee, while NCC also selected the operators that are going to be part of the committee. The NCC Act does not interfere in any dispute of commercial transactions between parties, unless the parties involved invited NCC, who will then call them for dialogue,” he said.
In response to this new development, the Association of Licensed Telecommunications Operators of Nigeria (ALTON), on behalf of telcos, stressed that the debt will not be forgiven.
ALTON Chairman, Gbenga Adebayo in his goodwill address to the EVC, said, “The banks owe us money. The debt is now over N200bn. It won’t go away, no one will forget the debt if the money is not paid.”
Recall that earlier this year, the same matter was also debated among the stakeholders under the leadership of the immediate past EVC of NCC, Prof. Umar Danbatta, who noted that banks had agreed to pay telcos following the actions of regulators and stakeholders.
But at this juncture, telcos have threatened to seek redress in court since there was no resolution in sight. At the time, Adebayo declared, “I think it is best to withdraw the services. On this issue of USSD debt, if parties have to go to court to get a final resolution, so be it. This is because every effort that is being made by everyone, where we move one step forward, several steps backward, is not going to work.”
Adebayo also revealed that telcos now pay 52 different taxes and levies, making them one of the most taxed in the country. He highlighted that these taxes are impacting how they operate and impeding growth in the sub-sector.
The ALTON Chairman decried that this development has placed the sector as the most highly taxed sector of the economy while condemning the low quality service rendered and its ripple effect.
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