Danbatta, who raised the alarm at the South-West stakeholders’ parliament with relevant agencies in charge of telecommunications entitled “Optimizing the benefits of Telecoms Infrastructure in Nigeria”, held in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital, added that “shutting of the telecommunications base stations engenders security risk”.
DAILY POST recalls that some state governments including Kogi through Kogi State Internal Revenue Service (KGIRS), recently shut down telecommunications base stations of some of the telecommunications companies operating in the state due to issues bothering on levies and taxes.
But, Danbatta, who was represented by the Director of Legal and Regulatory Services of the commission, Mrs.Yetunde Akinloye, said “the habit of shutting down stations must stop”.
Danbatta stated that the state governments and other agencies should rather be interested in protecting the base stations and other telecom infrastructures”.
While urging governments to devise other means of dealing with the issues that have do with tax collection on base stations and telecoms infrastructure, Danbatta called for “transparency in the mode of collecting taxes and other revenue on the telecoms industries by the state governments”.
Director of Compliance Monitoring and Enforcement of NCC, Mr. Efosa Idehen, who said state governments can rake in more internally generated revenue (IGR) using telecoms, urged the state governments to balance the drive for IGR demand with developmental needs of the state.
He charged them not to drive away investors from their states but encourage them, while enjoining service providers and the state governments to work together and harmonize their positions.