In the previous five years, over 50,000 instances of significant damage to telecoms equipment and facilities have been documented nationwide, raising concerns about the impact of these incidents on the caliber of telecommunications services in Nigeria.
Prof. Umar Danbatta, the executive vice chairman of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), revealed this at the Youth Civil Society and Stakeholders Summit (YCSSS) 2022, which was held midweek at the Army Resource Centre in Abuja. Prof. Danbatta expressed concern over how these incidents have continued to affect consumers’ quality of experience (QoE) and called for coordinated efforts from the general public and security agencies to reverse this trend.
The negative effects of ongoing vandalism of telecoms equipment, as shown by fiber cuts, theft of telecoms facilities like generators at sites, vandalism of base stations, among other vices, have become a major burden on the service providers, while telecoms consumers have continued to suffer unjustified disruptions of their hard-earned services, according to a statement released by Danbatta on Friday.
According to him, “the impact of infrastructure vandalism is felt by all in the quality of services supplied as it results in growing drop calls, data and Internet connectivity disruptions, aborted and undelivered short messaging services (SMS), as well as numerous failed calls.”
The NCC‘s Chief Executive Officer said that, considering the well-known fact that the ability to connect and communicate is fundamental to human existence, improvement in businesses processes, government services, education, as well as social and family networking through seamless connections, every community should get involved in protecting the critical infrastructure that makes these services possible.
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“Therefore, as a community, you are expected to report cases of vandalism of telecoms infrastructure to the nearest law enforcement agencies such as the Police, Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, and also share adequate information received from NCC with your family, friends, and neighbours.
“We believe, with your cooperation as critical stakeholders in the telecoms sector, we can all work with the law enforcement authorities in protecting telecoms infrastructure in your community”, Danbatta stated to emphasise the role of the communities in protecting critical national assets.
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