By Emmanuel Elebeke
Rising from its  national executive committee meeting, the President of the Association of Telecom Companies of  Nigeria (ATCON), Engr. Titi Omo-Ettu has reiterated his administration’s resolve to  respect all laws of government and directives of the Nigerian Communication.

Omo-Ettu said this at the meeting on Monday, held in its secretariat in Lagos.
He  also called on all  ATCON members  to respect the  laws of the land and seek the co-operation of ATCON in resolving all matters relating to the industry.

He commended the federal government in its ongoing efforts of policy review of the communications legislation, describing it as a vision of a unified information communications technology industry,  that  encompasses a convergence and transformation of the broadcast, telecommunications and computer industries into an ICT industry.

The ATCON boss  however, warned  the government to be cautious in implementing its  merger programme  of the NCC and NBC, and  ensure that the exercise is holistically carried out to accommodate every other sister organizations in the industry to guarantee efficiency and quality of service delivery.

emphasized the need  for a regular meeting between the regulator (NCC) and the representatives of the operators, saying that such meeting would help stakeholders to  fine-tune easy measures that will help them in resolving contentious issues in the telecom industry. An initiative he said can also help in alleviating litigations in a manner similar to what is deployed by members of the public on the NCC Telecom consumers parliament.

On taxation, the ATCON boss  frowned at what he described as an  unfair taxation against ATCON members, even at the local government level, and advised the government to always  resist the temptation of  levying  a windfall on telecommunications companies.

He said  that establishing a harmonized payment tax system at local, state and federal government levels,  in line with their constitutional obligations would rather help to address the issue of unfair taxation, rather than targeting at a particular sector in the industry.

Also on SIM Card registration, Engr. Omo-Ettu  commended the federal government for proposing a  parliamentary act that would give the exercise a legal backing , but called for 24 months implementation period to enable the operators carry out a thorough job.
And to achieve this, he said the NCC must embark on a vigorous enlightenment campaign to sensitise the members of the public for them to fully  take  part in the process.
Similarly, Engr. Omo-Ettu called for a longer time lag for the implementation of number portability,  insisting that the exercise does not require any hurry in its implementation procedure by either government or its agencies but a gradual process.

He described it as  a tool by which the telecom industry can improve its service delivery.
“We see number portability as an acceptable industry management tool by which industry can improve its delivery. the benefits of number portability is however not as dramatic as to let it be handled in  a hurry. While, accepting its desirability a longer implementation period is equally desirable,” he stated.

When asked to comment on the implication of the recent demolition of masts at the federal capital territory by the National Site Regulatory Agency (NASERA), the ATCON President described the action as unfortunate that could lead to multiple regulation in the industry. He however said that the association had already gone to court to challenge the exercise.