Telecommunication giant, MTN has revealed that about 60 million users, representing 85% of its subscribers, have linked their National Identification Number (NIN) to their SIM as of April 25th.
This is not the first time MTN is bouncing back and swaying through the tide. Recall that Investors King reported that MTN gnashed a whopping N298.7 billion profit despite subscribers declining by 8 million to 68.5 million in 2021.
MTN claims that 19 million of its users were affected when the government ordered telecoms to prohibit outgoing calls on phone lines that were not yet linked on April 4, 2022.
However, as of April 25, 8.7 million people who were previously restricted, had submitted their NINs for verification, with about 1.2 million of them being reinstated.
In its first-quarter financial results, MTN reported that its subscribers had increased to 70.2 million as of March 30, 2022.
However, as of April, nearly 10 million of its subscribers had not yet linked their NIN.
MTN stated: “Following the NCC’s directive on 4 April 2022 that all operators should restrict outgoing calls for subscribers whose SIMs are not associated with NINs, we implemented the directive on approximately 19 million of our affected subscribers at that date.
“However, subscribers whose outgoing calls were restricted for non-submission of their NINs require their NINs to be verified before being reactivated. As at 25 April 2022, about 8.7 million of those restricted submitted their NINs for verification, of which approximately 1.2 million have been reactivated, many of whom are high-value customers.
“Outgoing voice revenue from the subscribers who are yet to be reactivated therefore contributed approximately 7.8% of total service revenue based on FY 2021. In terms of how general traffic trends have evolved since the implementation of the directive, we have seen a drop off in traffic following our compliance with the directive”.
However, the company added that it has begun to witness a slow recovery as affected users are reconnected and voice conversations are resumed.
“As MTN Nigeria, we continue to engage our affected subscribers while providing hardware support for the National Identity Management Commission to accelerate the verification of NINs submitted. We have taken significant steps to help drive NIN enrolment for subscribers who do not yet have a NIN, deploying over 4,200 points of enrolment across the country. We have also provided multiple channels to enable our customers to submit their NIN for verification and linkage,” the company stated.