Why SIM cards previously linked to NIN were barred–NCC

The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has revealed why some telecommunications subscribers who previously linked their SIM cards to their National Identification Numbers (NINs) were barred from the network.

Telecommunications companies had over the weekend disconnected over 40 million subscribers who did not present their NINs in line with Nigeria’s Subscribers Identification Module and NIN linkage policy.

The Chairman of the Association of Licensed Telecommunications Operators of Nigeria (ALTON), Gbenga Adebayo, disclosed this in a statement on Sunday.

This represents a 28 million increase over the 12 million telephone lines initially deactivated by telcos.

The NCC spokesman, Reuben Muoka, who featured on Channels Television’s The Morning Brief programme on Monday, said people who probably didn’t get a cleared or verified NIN have been barred because the earlier ones they submitted were not good.

He said some SIM cards have verification and identification issues like disparity in information such as names and other data.

The spokesman said the NCC has been going through one deadline after the other since 2022 to “give extension for convenience but it is time to get to a closure.”

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“There are still some subscribers whose NINs are yet to be verified by NIMC and those have to also be corrected,” he said.

Many subscribers have complained that they had previously linked their NIN with their SIM cards years ago but the NCC official said some lines were barred because the information on the NIN did not tally with what the customers registered with their SIM cards.

He said subscribers would have to visit the outlets of their service providers to validate their NINs and resolve other matters.

“For now, it requires those physical visits to the stations to get it verified and validated but in the future, we hope that this will be done virtually,” Mouka added.

The NCC had last week directed telecom service providers to bar subscribers who failed to link their phone numbers to their NIN by February 28.