Telcos deny barring telephone lines over planned protest

The Association of Licensed Telecommunication Operators of Nigeria (ALTON) has denied reports linking the barring of subscribers’ lines by telecommunication companies to the planned national protest.

Telecommunication companies commenced the disconnection of telephone lines not linked with national identification numbers (NINs) on Saturday.

TheCable observed that crowds besieged the offices of MTN Nigeria, the most affected network, in some parts of the country over blocked lines on Monday.

The restriction comes ahead of a planned nationwide protest billed for August 1.

Speaking on the issue, ALTON, in a statement signed by Gbenga Adebayo, its president, said there is “absolutely no connection” between the barring of lines and the protest.

ALTON said the latest disconnection is related to the July 31 deadline set by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) for telcos to bar all subscribers whose NINs have not been linked to phone lines.

The telecommunication group said the harmonisation exercise of the SIM registration database and national identity database has been ongoing for several months.

“This is aimed at improving the integrity of the National SIM registration database. Customers who had their lines blocked recently are those whom their service providers found a mismatch between their records on both databases,” the association said.

“We advise such customers to contact their service providers through communicated channels for resolution of the issue.”

HOW TO UNBLOCK YOUR LINE ON ANY NETWORK

Providing a solution, ALTON said all operators have put in place measures to ensure that anyone whose line is blocked can unblock it.

To do so, the association recommended the following steps:

1. Airtel: Dial *121# and input your eleven-digit NIN number. The subscriber will receive a confirmation message that you have successfully unbarred your Airtel SIM card.

2. 9Mobile: Dial *200*8#.

3. Glo: Dial *109* and your NIN number#. For example, if your NIN is 12345678901, you would dial *109*12345678901# and follow the prompts to submit your NIN for linkage.

4. MTN: If an MTN line is barred, all the subscriber needs do is visit nin.mtn.ng, to check the NIN status, and if not linked, proceed to link it. During the process, an OTP would be requested, as well as the NIN. After giving consent and submitting the NIN-linking request, it will be done and the line will be automatically unbarred.

5. Smile: Send your valid NIN to [email protected] or call 07020444444. You will be asked to provide consent, and upon receipt of customer consent and successful verification of NIN, the line will be unbarred.

6. Spectranet: Call toll-free line 8002345678, email [email protected], or visit the Spectranet website to submit your NIN. KYC completion at a Spectranet store is necessary to finalise the process.

7. Ntel: The customer should visit any Ntel store with their NIN, fingerprint is used to call up their existing KYC profile with Ntel for verification, consent is received and the line is updated and unbarred.

ALTON also said if the online steps fail, subscribers can physically visit any walk-in centres of operators to unblock their lines.