The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has revealed it is planning to implement a national mobile roaming strategy. With the strategy, NCC said it will enable mobile operators in the country strengthen their operations and compete favourably.
The national mobile roaming is the ability of a cellular customer to automatically make and receive voice calls, send and receive data, or access other services, including data services, when travelling outside the coverage area of the home network, by means of using a visited network.
Executive Vice Chairman of NCC Prof. Umar Danbatta in a statement entitled ‘Consultation Paper on National Mobile Roaming’, said national mobile roaming features in several communication licences but has not yet been utilized in the country.
According to Danbatta, even though it was technically possible to provide facility for domestic roaming, appropriate legal and regulatory framework have to be in place in order to encourage as well as assist the operators in realising roaming arrangement between them without any uncertainty.
He added that the policies, rules and regulation to be adopted regarding national roaming are formulated in detailed discussion with the operators as they are the main entities responsible for the successful implementation of the domestic roaming facility.
