The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has stopped MTN Nigeria Communications from implementation of a tariff plan called MTN TruTalk+ or face serious sanctions as the regulator said it did not give any approval for such service. The Commission also barred MTN from further advertisement of such service in the print, electronic media or its websites.

The Commission in a letter dated May 19, 2015 with ref No NCC/MTN/18/15 and signed by the Head, Compliance Monitoring and Enforcement, Mr. Efosa Idehen and Head, Legal and Regulatory Services, Mrs. Yetunde Akinloye, said the records of the Commission shows that the operator has no approval of the regulatory authority before embarking on the new promotional tariff plan.

The Commission said that its Compliance Unit revealed that the new tariff with daily access fee of N5, allows subscribers to call all networks at 11k/sec and N20k/sec to UK, USA, India, Canada and China.

“The Commission’s investigations showed that MTN Nigeria Communications Ltd has already configured this tariff plan on their network and has therefore implemented same” without the appropriate regulatory approval. It said the action contravenes section 108 (1) of the Nigeria Communications Act 2003.

“Consequent upon the above, the Commission thereby directs MTN Nigeria Communications Ltd to immediately discontinue this Tariff Plan and all associated advertisements regarding same or otherwise face regulatory sanctions accordingly” it said.

The NCC has initiated this action in fulfilment of its mandate under section 89 of NCC Act 2003 having carried out a compliance check on the recently introduced MTN Nigeria Limited TruTalk+ Tariff Plan.

Following the compliance check, it was confirmed that MTN Nigeria is currently advertising a Tariff Plan called MTN TruTalk+ in the print and electronic media. The NCC investigations showed that MTN Nigeria has already configured this Tariff Plan on its network and has therefore implemented same.