A month into the Mobile Number Portability scheme introduced by the Nigerian Communications Commission, telecoms subscribers in the country are still complaining of poor quality services from their respective networks.
Various complaints, including dropped calls and network failure, among others, have continued to emerge from subscribers in the country contrary to expectations that the MNP will address such problems.
Most subscribers, who spoke to our correspondent, said the MNP remained an ideal initiative, but could not be effectively tapped into following recurrent cases of poor services, which had characterised the operations of all the mobile networks, especially the Global System of Mobile communication operators.
A visit to some network operators’ care centres in Lagos showed a high sense of indifference by subscribers to the MNP scheme.
Though they commended the NCC for a job well done as far as the regulation of the industry was concerned, the subscribers still believed the network operators needed to do a lot more to win the confidence of Nigerians.
Mr. Olu Akande, a subscriber who spoke to our correspondent at the service centre of one of the operators at the City Mall, Ikeja, said he was not concerned about the MNP scheme because he already had two telephone lines in different mobile phones.
“If any of the lines I am holding is having network problem, I switch to the other. I can’t kill myself. No one network is better than the other. They are all the same,” Akande said.
Speaking on the reason why he visited the care centre, he said one of his Subscriber Identification Module cards had stopped functioning and he had to fix it.
Another subscriber, Ms. Magdalene Ufot, said though the idea behind the MNP was laudable, it might not achieve much because of the style developed by subscribers over the years.
According to her, apart from people carrying multiple phones, the issue of dual and triple SIM phones remained a major constraint to number porting.
Ufot said, “If you ask me, I don’t have a reason to want to port. But come to think of it, if I have a phone that supports two or three SIMs simultaneously, where will I be porting to? Of course, I can switch from one network to the other at will.
“I heard that if you port into a network, you can’t leave that network until after 90 days. For me, a multiple SIM phone will pay me.”
Speaking on the development, the Director, Public Affairs, NCC, Mr. Tony Ojobo, said in an interview with our correspondent that poor QoS might not be unconnected with attempts by all network operators to replace some of their legacy infrastructure.
According to him, most of the operators are currently upgrading their networks.
Ojobo said, “We have received complaints on the drop in QoS. Mind you, we just lifted the ban on promos. We are trying to see if this has any impact on the QoS. We are still studying all of these.
“The MNP launch has been successful. People are porting as we speak. Now, there is good competition and the customer is key.”