ATCON Offers Recipe for Universal Access

To make phones cheaper and more accessible, network owners in Nigeria want government to eliminate import tariff and multiple taxations.
 

Ekesiani with NCC spokesman Imoko

In an industry that has witnessed exploding growth since 2002, operators say government could still extend the

 benefit to more people if it reviews import tariff on telecom import to between 0% and 2.5%.

Duties on import oscillates between 20% to 25%, though operators claim payments often go as high as 35% of the original value of the imported equipment.

But that is not the only problem. Network owners have to contend with what they call ‘multiple taxations’ from federal, state and local authorities. In addition to VAT, Lagos State government is already fine-tuning plans to introduce Sales Tax.

Network owners under the aegis of the Association of Telecom Companies of Nigeria (ATCON) said such revenue generation exercises reduce telcos’ investment capital that could be ploughed into network expansion.

“We are still a young industry and need to be pampered for some time,” said senior ATCON official Gerry Ekesiani. Over 4m mobile lines and one million landlines have been unloaded into the national network in the last two years.

Operators say the figures could be higher if government put more measures in place to make the sector more conducive.

Ekesiani, who is also the CEO of Lagos based Geosanna Limited, advised the Nigerian government to take a cue from its South African counterpart. “South Africa has been able increase its teledensity. It does not charge anything on telecom import, said Ekesiani adding, “from next year,
telecoms import among members of the European Community would attract zero duty.”

Ekesiani spoke in Lagos at a three-day training sponsored by the Nigerian Communications Commission for the IT journalists.


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