Hundreds of telecom subscribers on Thursday in Ibadan, Oyo State besieged the MTN office at the Mobil Area, expressing outrage over the provider’s registration exercise.
The provider had sent text messages to subscribers to visit their centres to complete their mobile registration or lose their mobile lines.
The subscribers said that the manner in which the registration exercise was being carried out by MTN was inhuman.
Dr Luis Oluwadamilola, a former Chairman of the Nigerian Medical Association (NMA), said he was at the MTN office based on the message sent to him to complete his registration.
Oluwadamilola said he had visited the MTN office four times and had not been able to register his line.
He said that he ran away the last time he came to the MTN office because he met mobile policemen there and felt there was no reason to endanger his life.
“I don’t think there is any justification for what we are witnessing here.
“If it is a directive of the Nigeria Communications Commission, then the telecom providers should have increased the numbers of staff to attend to customers for an easy exercise.
“I bought this line for N60,000 the first week the telecom provider began services in Nigeria and I have been recharging the line since then.
“So, why should they be treating me like a job applicant?
“Considering my profession and holding up here is a calamitous situation because I don’t know what will happen to my patients while here,’’ he said.
Similarly, Mr Gbenga Opadotun, the Chairman, Oyo State Council of Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), said that the development was disheartening.
“I got a text message from MTN this morning for registration of my SIM card and on getting here, I met over 1,000 people waiting helplessly with no one to attend to them.
“MTN is a South African company and doing this to Nigerians is heart rending. We are customers who patronise them and pay a stiff price at that.
“I feel very sad and I will like to urge the appropriate authorities to call MTN to order.
“ We are their customers and should be treated with respect and dignity,’’ the visibly angry NUJ chairman said.
All efforts to get a staff of the MTN in Ibadan to comment on the development proved abortive as none of them was willing to speak.
A source at the NCC headquarters in Abuja, however, said that the commission gave the directive to telecom providers on noticing that some subscribers had not registered their lines.
The source, who craved anonymity because he was not authorised to speak, said NCC ordered the providers to get their subscribers registered or be fined N200,000 per unregistered but active SIM card.
