N1.4tn fine: Reps reject N330bn offer by MTN, summon minister
John Ameh, Abuja
The House of Representatives has rejected the offer of $1.7bn (N330bn) by telecommunications giant, MTN, out of the total of $3.9bn that it was fined by the Nigerian Communications Commission for SIM card registration infractions.
The House Committee on Telecommunications, which reacted to the development on Friday in Abuja, said the news of the reduced fine from the original figure of N1.4trn came as a “surprise” to lawmakers.
The chairman of the committee, Mr. Saheed Fijabi, said the immediate action of the committee was to summon the Minister of Communications, Mr. Adebayo Shittu, to explain the turn of events.
Fijabi stated that the House was still investigating the ongoing negotiations between the Federal Government and MTN on the fine and would not buy into the idea of the reduced fine while the investigation was in progress.
Fijabi recalled that the last time the minister appeared before the committee, he had told lawmakers that the negotiations had been put on hold pending the outcome of the House investigation.
He said, “It came to us as a surprise to hear that MTN is paying N300bn or N330bn.
“How can the company be paying that amount when the minister told us that everything was stalled pending the outcome of our investigation?
“As a House, we have opposed the reduction of the fine because there is no provision in the NCC’s Act that the fine can be reduced.
“In fact, Section 21 of the Act stipulates that even the CEO of a defaulting firm can be made to pay additional fine of over N200, 000 on each of the lines.
“This means that MTN’s total fine should be doubled to about N3tn and not even the N1.4tn it was asked to pay.”
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