The Nigerian Communications Commission has deployed more than 2,000 centres for the ongoing registration of Subscriber Identity Module cards across the country, its Executive Vice-Chairman, Dr. Eugene Juwah, has disclosed.
A statement made available by the spokesman for the NCC, Mr. Reuben Muoka, in Abuja, on Monday, said Juwah made the disclosure when the Maitama branch of the Nigerian Society of Engineers paid him a courtesy visit.
Insisting that the registration exercise would end on September 28, Juwah said subscribers, who had already registered with their service providers, did not need to repeat the exercise with the centres appointed by the regulatory agency.
Juwah said before the NCC entered the SIM registration exercise, the commission and the operators met with the National Security Adviser, and that it was discovered that the operators had only registered eight million out of 89 million SIM cards, leaving a balance of 80 million.
He added that it was at this stage that it was decided that the operators and the NCC should begin to register existing SIM cards that had not been registered.
He said, “There were about 80 million SIM cards that were not registered and the government gave us six months to jointly conclude the registration of these numbers as this will enable us to conclude the registration within this time frame.
“The NCC does not register new subscribers, but if you had registered before with your operator, you don’t have to register again. It is the same data base. We are trying to cover the balance that the operators have not registered and we are doing this together with the operators.”
“We have mobilised and established more than 2,000 NCC registration centres across Nigeria while the operators are carrying out their own exercise.
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NCC deploys 2,000 SIM card registration centres