MTN risks facing additional fines if it does not meet the year-end deadline to pay the NGN 780 billion imposed already, Nigerian authorities have warned. Nigeria's Communications Minister Adebayo Shittu said that his country will not be cowed or threatened by MTN's announced
court challenge of the fine, The Independent reports.Shittu said the decision by the company to approach the Lagos High Court put it at risk of another fine if it failed to meet the deadline. Shittu said that while MTN had the right to seek the court's interpretation of the Nigerian Communications Commission's decision, nothing would stop the government from imposing additional fines on the operator at the expiry of the deadline. He noted that MTN had already admitted the infraction when it pleaded for leniency and obtained a reduction in the amount of the fine.
MTN's court appeal, led by former Nigerian Bar Association president Wole Olanipekun, claims that the NCC did not have the power to impose the fine, nor was MTN found guilty of an offence that would warrant it to pay such a fine. MTN argues that the NCC gave the operator an unreasonable deadline for disconnecting over 5 million unregistered subscribers of seven days and imposed the fine within only 24 hours of MTN's written submission on the disconnection exercise. The company said the deadline was unfair and ran contrary to the requirement to give adequate notice to subscribers to update their records. It accused the regulatory agency of overstepping its authority, acting as a legislator, executor, accuser, prosecutor, judge and beneficiary of the penalty.
