Telecommunications company MTN Nigeria has explained that the network outage experienced by its subscribers for the major part of Wednesday was caused by “multiple fibre cuts”.
MTN boasts of 87,038,768 subscribers as of December 2023, according to data by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), representing 38.79% of the total market share, the highest in the country by any licensed Mobile Network Operator (MNO).
The 87 million subscribers of the MNO experienced difficulty making and receiving calls for hours on Wednesday, fuelling rumours that the NCC had made do its threat that all telcos bar subscribers not linked to the National Identification Numbers (NIN), with February 28, 2024 as deadline.
Many subscribers were stranded with some persons visiting MTN offices nearest to them to get explanations.
However, MTN, in a post on X (formerly Twitter), attributed the situation to “multiple fibre cuts”.
“You have been experiencing challenges connecting to the network due to a major service outage caused by multiple fibre cuts affecting voice and data services,” the post read.
“Our engineers are working hard to resolve with services gradually being restored in some areas.
“We apologise for the inconvenience and ask for your patience and understanding as the team works to restore full service as soon as possible.”
Meanwhile, the NCC, on Wednesday, issued a directive to telecom service providers to bar subscribers who have failed to link their phone numbers to their NIN on or before February 28, 2024.
The Executive Vice Chairman of the Commission, Aminu Maida, who gave the directive through the Director of Public Affairs, Ruben Mouka, at the 45th Kaduna International Trade Fair on Wednesday, insisted that as matter of critical national security, telecom consumers must link their NIN to their SIM cards.
