The final phase of the disconnection of Subscriber Identity Module numbers (telephone lines) has commenced by the Telecommunication companies in Nigeria.
The disconnection was at first scheduled for April 15, 2024, but the Nigeria Communications Commission postponed it to July 31, 2024, after carefully considering the various challenges encountered by subscribers and requests for extensions.
Already in March 2024, the NCC disclosed that it had disconnected 4.2 million lines from its network as of February 28 this year in line with the NCC’s directive stating that the lines disconnected were those for which the subscribers did not submit their NIN.
In December 2023, the NCC issued an industry-wide directive requiring full barring of subscriber lines not linked to their NIN on or before February 28th, 2024.
It then subjected a total of 19 million lines to verification. Out of these, it said 4.3 million have been verified and 4.2 million disconnected as of 28 February 2024.
Customers that have submitted their NINs but remain unverified were to be barred on 15 April 2024. This deadline was, however, shifted even further with more directive that no customer can have more than 4 active SIMs and all such excess SIMs must be barred by 29 March 2024.
