The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has issued a new directive requiring all telecom licensees to publicly inform consumers about major service outages, including their causes, affected areas, and expected restoration timelines.
The Commission disclosed this in a statement signed by its Acting Director of Public Affairs, Mrs. Nnena Ukoha.
According to the NCC’s new directive, Mobile Network Operators (MNOs) must use media channels to notify consumers during unplanned service disruptions.
Additionally, in cases of planned service outages, customers must be notified at least one week in advance.
Compensation for subscribers
Under the directive, Mobile Network Operators, Internet Service Providers (ISPs), and other last-mile service providers must also provide proportional compensation, such as validity extensions, if an outage lasts longer than 24 hours.
This requirement aligns with the provisions of the Consumer Code of Practice Regulations.
The Commission said this move is part of its broader strategy to improve service quality, strengthen consumer protection, and foster transparency within the telecommunications sector.
The NCC defines a major outage as any of the following:
- A network condition, such as a fibre cut, vandalism, theft, or force majeure—that affects 5% or more of an operator’s subscriber base or impacts services across five or more Local Government Areas (LGAs).
- The unplanned shutdown or isolation of 100 or more network sites (or 5% of the total number of sites, whichever is less), or one entire network cluster, for 30 minutes or more.
- Any outage that significantly degrades service in Nigeria’s top 10 states by traffic volume, as identified periodically by the Commission.
To further strengthen monitoring, the NCC has mandated operators to log all major outages on its Major Outage Reporting Portal, accessible via the NCC website (www.ncc.gov.ng).
According to the Commission, the portal is open to the public and also identifies entities responsible for infrastructure damage.
Initial trial
Commenting on the Directive and the Major Outage Reporting Portal, the Director, Technical Standards and Network Integrity, Engr. Edoyemi Ogor stated that the Commission had trialled the reporting process and portal with operators for some months now before issuing the directive.
“By providing consumers and stakeholders in the telecommunications industry with timely and transparent information on network outages, we are entrenching a culture of accountability and transparency.
“This approach also ensures that culprits are held responsible for sabotage to telecommunications infrastructure.
It reinforces the need to safeguard these assets, given their centrality to national security, economic stability, and the everyday lives of Nigerians,” Engr Edoyemi Ogor said.
He added that the directive also supports the implementation of the Executive Order signed by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, which classifies telecom infrastructure as Critical National Information Infrastructure (CNII).
According to him, this classification reinforced the need to safeguard these assets, given their significance to national security, economic stability, and daily life.
