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Africa
Monday, May 3 2004
MTN Nigeria Communica-tions Limited Monday warned commissioners for the
National Communica-tions Commission (NCC) that they would be held liable for
contempt of court should the other GSM operators go ahead to implement the
new interconnect rates as announced by the NCC.
MTN's contention is that the court has made an order that the status quo
should be maintained pending the determination of the substantive suit.
But the NCC, which has another interpretation to the same ruling, maintains
that no such order exists from any court.
MTN in its desire to ensure that the new interconnect rates do not take
effect wrote the Commissioners of the NCC reminding them that they would be
liable for contempt of court should the operators go ahead to implement the
new contentious rates.
Based on the tone of the letter which one commissioner described as "rude",
the NCC commissioners wrote to put off a scheduled visit to Lagos to inspect
MTN's new switching centres yesterday.
The Assistant Public Relations Manager, Mrs. Atim Mkpubre, acknowledged last
night that MTN had received the letter from NCC rescheduling the visit of
the board members to MTN Lagos.
She however insisted that the letter only talked of rescheduling and not
cancellation although no date had been fixed for the inspection of
facilities.
He said, "NCC did not go because we found the action of MTN's lawyer
disrespectful. Our not going is to make a firm comment on the action of the
lawyer."
MTN had also recently written to telecom operators with whom it had
interconnect agreement asking them that the contractual obligation to which
they entered before the new interconnect rates controversy should be
maintained.
Mkpubre said what the company had done in that regard was just to state the
obvious. According to her, until the court dispensed with the case, the old
rates which the other operators signed with MTN remains.
In the new rates announced by the NCC, calls from fixed network operators
which terminate on GSM networks attract a rate of N11.52 per minute. If it
is the other way round, from GSM to PTOs, GSM operators pays the PTOs N5.52
per minute.
From the initial commencement date of January 1, the Commission shifted the
take-off date of the new interconnect regime to April 1.
When it announced the new rates in December last year, the NCC said "The
Commission believes that the interconnect rates as published is for the good
of the industry and will not in any way discourage any operator that is
genuinely interested in doing business in Nigeria as well as interested in
advancing the cause of fair pricing to both the network operators and the
consumers."
"In the process of developing the new interconnect rates for the industry,
the Commission held consultative forums for all operators and received
inputs which were taken into consideration before taking its decision. The
Commission thereby advises all operators to abide by its ruling," it stated.
The rates were expected to reduce the airtime tariff prevailing in the
industry.
Both MTN and Econet had gone to court to challenge the ruling. In the last
ruling on the issue by a Federal High Court in Abuja, Hon. Justice Binta
Nyako struck out Econet's application pointing out that the processes
required to be followed before the court action had not been followed.
Econet has however appealed the ruling which has been slated for mention on
May 7.
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