The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) on Wednesday said a decision to transfer Visafone licence to MTN had not yet been taken.
The commission also said what had been approved in the transaction was 100 per cent shareholding, not licence.
This information was contained in a statement in Abuja by Mr Tony Ojobo, the commission’s Director of Public Affairs.
Ojobo said that NCC’s final approval to the changes in shareholding of Visafone Communications was taken by virtue of Section 38 of the Nigerian Communications Act (NCA), 2003.
The spokesman said the Act stated that “the granting of a licence shall be personal to the licencee.’’
According to him, the licence shall not be operated by, assigned, sub-licenced or transferred to any other party unless the prior written approval of the commission has been granted.
“This is contrary to the speculation in a section of the media that the NCC, the regulatory agency for telecommunication, had foreclosed the release of the spectrum held by Visafone to MTN.
“This clarification has become necessary in order to allay the fears in some quarters that the frequency had been withheld by the commission.
“ The commission is yet to meet to take a decision on the application by Visafone to transfer its licence to MTN.
“ The NCC has only approved the shareholding structure by 100 percent and not transfer of licence,’’ he said.
He said Visafone Communications Limited with a Universal Access Service Licence (UASL) – deploying Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) technology– applied to NCC for an approval to effect a change in its shareholding structure by transferring 100 percent of its shares to MTN Nigeria.
“Having met all the preliminary requirements for grant of approval for change in shareholding structure, the NCC in line with its established procedure granted an Approval-In-Principle to Visafone Communications Limited,’’ he said.
This, he said, was subject to fulfilment of conditions to transfer 100 percent of its shares to MTN Nigeria.
“Having fulfilled the conditions stipulated in the Approval-In-Principle, the NCC, in line with its procedure, granted a “Final-Approval” to Visafone for the change in its shareholding structure.
“Thereafter, Visafone applied for approval to transfer its licence to MTN.
“The NCC has written to Visafone clearly stating that a decision was yet to be taken on the transfer of Visafone licence to MTN,’’ he said.
