By Olabisi Olaleye
STRONG indications emerged last week that some telecommunications operators may shut down their operations in six states of the federation, owing to multiple taxes, and incessant closure of Base Transceiver Stations (BTS).
Speaking at the weekend in Lagos, Chairman of the Association of Licensed telecommunications Operators of Nigeria (ALTON), Gbenga Adebayo, said that the telcos continued harassment by state agents in some of their facilities was impacting negatively on quality of service.
The states where services may be shut down are Ogun, Ondo, Akwa- Ibom, Ebonyi, Osun and Kaduna.
According to ALTON, incessant cases of arbitrary site closure in many states of the federation which is an attempt to cohearse service providers to pay local taxes and levies some of which amounted to multiple taxation in nature and are only targeted at telecoms operators.
Adebayo disclosed that the affected states are treating the industry as extractive sector by imposing myriads of taxes on members and closing down the BTS sites arbitrarily using their agents, not minding the security and economic implications on the states. Adebayo also lamented that telecommunications operators would be subjected to the payment of taxes including ‘Eco Tax for gaseous emission and gaseous emission’ when players do not have moving machineries and production lines; sewage, sanitation and public convenience levy, when they do not run an hotel and bar operations.
“What has telecoms services got to do with sanitation or refuse effluent tax, when we don’t operate fast food centers? How can a base station situated on farm land be regarded as business premises and therefore liable to business premises tenement rate payment? Why is the rate charged per base station in the urban areas different from the rate applied for residential and commercial buildings when the infrastructure occupies the same land?
Adebayo disclosed that telecommunications operators have resolved that, arbitrary sealing of sites, without following the guidelines clearly provided by the Nigeria Communications Commission (NCC) and in line with best practices will no longer be tolerated.
He maintained that “any state or local government authority that closes our sites: our members will not reopen such sites: we will serve the necessary warnings and if such practices continue: we are then faced with two options: first is to pay the charges by such state government, and to increase the tariff chargeable for calls originating and terminating from networks in such states: With all the attendant service delivery issues.”