So MTN has decided to pay the fine at last, $1.7 billion in total. I know what some of you were thinking when you first read about the telecoms giant being fined, you must have been like, "Oh, they'd just bribe someone and someone and then we'd never hear of it again." Uh... no, sorry to burst your bubble. Yes, the fine was beat down from a staggering $5.2 billion to $1.7 billion, but I assure you they are going to pay.
What did they do wrong? Well, all telecoms operators in Nigeria were given a deadline to register their subscribers by the NCC... remember when many people were flocking to the various MTN outlets to get their SIM cards registered? 5.2 million subscribers were discovered unregistered. The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) slapped them with a N200,000 per unregistered subscriber. Do the math.
MTN immediately sent 'junior' officials from their Headquarters in South Africa. This was a slap to the NCC and Nigeria. They didn't think it was serious, but now it is. Unregistered SIM cards aid in terrorism, so in a way, MTN's slip up has lead to thousands of deaths. Ripple effect.
No comments:
Post a Comment