The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has concluded plans to forestall financial leakages in the telecommunication industry.
This is as the commission unveiled its IT solution, Revenue Assurance Solution (RAS) to monitor the revenue generated by its licensees.
The executive vice-chairman of the NCC, Umar Danbatta made the disclosure in Abuja on Friday during a virtual interactive session with the industry’s stakeholders.
Danbatta explained that RAS will be used to look into the annual operating levy (AOL) payable to the federal government of each telecom operator and detect the exact amount of revenue generated yearly.
“The financial burden of deployment will be on the operators. This project relieves the commission of the initial financial burden that will be required for the deployment of the RAS project.
“It will also ensure that accurate revenue generated by the licensed network operators are tracked, analysed and utilised for the benefit of the industry. Beyond revenue assurance, when deployed, the NCC RAS will bring a lot of solutions to the industry,” the vice-chairman stated.
Danbatta noted that the IT solution is designed to effectively monitor and regulate the licensees in the industry.
This, according to him, will enable NCC to validate the information, records and data supplied to it from time to time but the operators.
Stressing the need to block loopholes in the industry’s compilation of data, Danbatta pointed that the annual operating levy is a very vital tool in the regulation of the telecommunications industry.
“AOL can be described as the tap root of an efficient and effective telecommunications regulatory environment. The mechanisms for collection and computation of AOL, are of interest and important to both the regulator, and the operating networks.
“In Nigeria, the importance of AOL is well expressed in the Nigerian Communications Act 2003. Some of the objectives of the AOL regulations, as provided in part 1 (2) of the AOL Regulations 2014, are to “create and provide a regulatory framework for the effective and efficient administration by the Commission of the Annual Operating Levy regime and all matters related thereto;
“Stipulate the mode and methods of assessment of Annual Operating Levy and the payment modes thereof; specify guiding standards and principles for the administration by the Commission of the Annual Operating Levy regime,” he stated.
The Commission’s helmsman maintained that the size of the nation’s telecommunications industry made the revenue assurance solutions a necessity for accuracy.