Nigeria shuts Down illegal Telecoms Operators

Mast-telecomSeven telecoms operators in Lagos for tapping illegally from 5.4GHz frequency band have been clamped down by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC).

Three of the affected operators were axed for their failure to obtain the required license on the frequency band they operated on.

The exercise started on Tuesday in Lagos and  lasted till Friday when the NCC team led by the commissions Head of Enforcement ýUnit, Salisu Abdu went with Spectrum monitoring van (SMV) to examine and confirm riding of the culpable service providers on the 5.4GHz frequency.

The companies are Switch Talk Technologies, Multi Dimension Technologies Limited and Net com Africa and Steel Broadcasting Company while three yet to be identified provide network service to Dstv.

The 5.4GHz frequency band used to be a license free frequency, in 2009 NCC came up with guidelines for deployment of services in 5.4 and 5.4 to 5.7 is now a licensable band that no operator should operate on that particular frequency until he purchase the license of operation.

Another monitoring exercise was carried out by the Director Spectrum Administrative Department of the commission and discovered that some operators about seven are operating in the 5.4GHz and that is why we are in Lagos.

Source: Daily Trust