FORMER CHAIRMAN OF AMOWO ODOFIN RASHEED OTOLORIN

FORMER CHAIRMAN OF AMOWO ODOFIN RASHEED OTOLORIN

Rasheed Otolorin former chairman of Amuwo Odofin am here for the launching of community police and traffic marshal in Amuwo Odofin area.

This is the first time is existing even during my time of regime it was not existing, I support thi idea because it’s a good initiative and a welcome development.

 He gave a suggestion concerning yardstick of the initiative by saying that the local council has to come in as well as the government because whosoever is on power has a security vote which is not for the chairman to pocket but to assist the police financially so that they can carryout their duty very well, but if this initiative is not supported financially is going to die because the member of the community policy and traffic marshal needs to be motivated and encouraged to be effective and active.

The former chairman further said if the initiative have  a special voting is not going to die even if there is continuous change in D.P.O and we stand on our grounds as a community the initiative will not die.

The future of this initiative is very bright provided the local council will come into the initiative because is the responsibility of the council as its government money for the people that is why the new Sole administration has to be present to grace the occasion as this is suppose to be its first assignment.

During my tenure I was able to meet up with the security issue despite there was no money, but we were able to overcome the security issue.

WASPAN PRESS RELEASE

Waspan, registered as wireless application service providers of Nigeria LTD/GTE, is a self-regulating industry group incorporated on the 10^th of June, 2008. This professional umbrella body comprises value-added services licensees running best practice businesses in Nigeria and 15 other African countries- with affiliation across the global telecommunication industry. 

This group comprises firms of very high international repute, having helped develop similar subsectors in other African markets. We constantly engage various stakeholders of the telecommunications value chain such as the Nigerian communication commission (NCC), mobile network operators (MNOS), and Nigeria copyright commission, copyright society of Nigeria (COSON), Nigerian digital music monitoring group (NDMMG) and other relevant industry players and associations. In addition, we are members of some of NCC’s sub-bodies for policy making, research and development, disciplinary measures and general development. Our member firms are licensed by the NCC (Communications).

In addition to our VALUE ADDED SERVICE (VAS) business expertise, we also stand for the promotion of healthy public perception of value-added services and promote individual member-firms interest on a level playing field. Our members have individual business agreements with all MNOS in Nigeria: MTN, AIRTEL, GLOBACOM, ETISALAT,etc.

In the spirit of promoting healthy public perception of value added services, WASPAN is concerned with the barrage of complaints that mobile subscribers have about vas such as unsolicited calls and sms, spamming, forced activations, deduction of call credit etc. we had addressed these issues in recent past and will going forward invest more in educating mobile subscribers and help them to be better informed and become more savvy in the use of their mobile phones and services that can better enhance the quality of their lives. However, we may need to highlight 

Spam is the indiscriminate use of electronic messaging systems to send unsolicited bulk messages especially advertising. While the most widely recognized form of spam is e-mail spam, the term is applied to similar abuses in other media such as mobile phone messaging, instant messaging, web search engine, spam in blogs, wiki spam, online classified ads, social networking, television advertising and file sharing spam.

Spamming remains economically viable because the abusers have no operating costs beyond the management of their mailing lists, and it is difficult to hold senders.

As the term rightly implies, calls and messages become unsolicited when the mobile subscribers have not requested nor given consent to such calls or messages. The challenge here is mainly because mobile subscribers do not read the terms and conditions of some of the services they subscribed to through their mobile phones. 

Often times, service providers also shroud such terms in and conditions in mystery at other times, there is basic disinterest in wanting to know or taking responsibility for their action or inaction. However, there are clear cases of deliberate infractions hence, the problem of unsolicited calls and sms. However, both vas companies and mobile subscribers have the dual responsibility to double – check services ahead of subscription to reduce the incidence of unsolicited calls and messages. 

WASPAN, the mobile network operators and NCC have taken active steps to arrest the situation of unsolicited calls and messages through relevant solutions with a view to protecting and educating mobile subscribers and customers.

The following are the joint resolutions by the trio of WASPAN, MNOS AND NCC:

·         No marketing sms or calls before 8am and after 8pm.

·         Do-not-disturb (DND)

The MNOS have immediately deployed DND portals that are accessible to all subscribers. Any subscribers. Any subscribers who wish to be on the portal would be requested to sms ‘stop’ to any short code on any network to get on to the DND list. All vas licensees shall be directed to implement the ‘stop’ functionality across all short codes. There will be transparent accessibility by NCC to the DND database of each mobile network operators when required. 

Further to this, every month all MNOS shall broadcast how to get on the DND portal to their subscribers. At the end of each quarter, subscribers will be required to renew their DND status by sending ‘stop’ to short codes on the network.

Marketing/ Promotional SMS

·         All marketing and promotional SMS originating from vas licensees shall not exceed 6 per day . This was reached in line with the 12-hours daily marketing window directed by NCC.

·         Deactivation of services

·         Subscribers shall be informed to SMS ‘End + keyword’ to service short codes on the respective networks to unsubscribe from specific services and sms “ END ALL” to services short codes to unsubscribe from all services they are subscribed to. All VAS licensees shall be directed to implement these steps on their respective short codes.

·         Subscriber issue resolution 

WASPAN shall set up a call center to assist subscribers with the processes above. The call center shall serve as a one-stop for all subscribers issues related to Value-Added Services. The call center shall submit periodic report to the MNOS and NCC. Any VAS licensees found to be in breach of the resolutions shall be duly sanctioned. In the interim, subscribers may reach WASPAN through help@waspan.ng

Signed

Chijioke E Ezeh

National Coordinator

WASPAN