By Clem Khena-Ogbena
The Consumer Protection Council (CPC) has declared its readiness to partner with the Nigeria Communications Commission, with a view to addressing permanently the perennial and intractable problem of poor service delivery by telecommunications operators in Nigeria.
The director-general of CPC, Mrs. Dupe Atoki, who made the declaration yesterday, during a meeting with chief executives of all telecom companies in the country, at the Council’s headquarters in Abuja, noted with regret that drop-calls, unsolicited messages, high tariff charges, among others, often suffered by subscribers had deprived them of enjoying quality service for their money worth.
While calling on the telecom service providers to improve on their service delivery, Atoki stated that the purposeful synergy between the CPC and the NCC would ensure that telecom consumers or subscribers had value for their money.
The meeting was a follow-up to a joint press conference addressed in December 2013 by the Minister of Communication Technology, Mrs. Omobola Johnson, the CPC boss and the Executive Vice Chairman, NCC, Dr. Eugene Juwah on poor telecom services in the country.
At the joint press conference, Atoki vowed that erring operators risked prosecution and jail terms if found to have committed consumer abuses, in addition to fines that might be imposed by the Sector Regulator, the N CC.
She stated, “The CPC can make orders in the interest and protection of consumers, and disobedience is also criminalised by law.
“While the NCC can impose fines or even revoke the licence of an offending operator, the CPC can, in addition, commit such recalcitrant offender to jail term for contravening any consumer protection enactment”.
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