The option of legal action is still on the table for telecommunications operators to compel Deposit Money Banks (DMBs) to repay the pending ₦120 billion Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD) debt.
The prolonged deadlock of around four years is leading to a growing discord between the telecoms sector and the financial industry.
Addressing reporters in Lagos over the weekend, Gbenga Adebayo, Chairman of the Association of Licensed Telecoms Operators of Nigeria (ALTON), expressed remorse that the matter had taken a political turn.
He stressed that the matter is commercial, alluding to the issue of willing buyers and willing sellers, adding: ‘When they didn’t pay, it was appropriate to just withdraw the service. But because, there was political interference, nobody could enforce those commercial terms.’
Read also: Nigerian Telcos To Yank Off Banks Over ₦120bn USSD Debt
‘So, when you open commercial agreement to political interference, you get into this kind of problem. That is why we say emphatically that some issues, including price review, should be left to market forces, not to be determined by government, because it is not sustainable.’
According to him, when ALTON met with the Minister of Communications, Innovation and Digital Economy, Dr. Bosun Tijani, recently, ‘the minister was sympathetic to us and stressed that if parties behave as responsible as they should be, the matter shouldn’t reach this level. It should have been resolved long before now. He agreed to take it up.’
However, Adebayo cautioned that if the matter remains unresolved, the withdrawal of services would become unavoidable.
Meanwhile, the Federal Government has inaugurated an Artificial Intelligence (AI) Research Scheme, planning to grant N5 million each to 45 startups and researchers.
Tijani disclosed the opening of applications during the weekend.
He mentioned that the goal was to promote the integration of AI for economic prosperity.