Nigeria’s Globacom is urging the central government to consider the role of telecom operators in helping to regulate the mobile money subsector.
At a recent seminar titled “Nigeria Transiting to a cashless society: Possibilities and Challenges,” Glo’s Director for Telebanking Tunde Kuponiyi argued that the current process of regulation is being driven by the banking sector and is leaving mobile operators behind, ensuring that tariffs and other factors in the mobile payment platform are not “telecom friendly.”
He added that telecom companies in Nigeria can contribute to new ideas and structure, but not with the current regulations in place.
Kuponiyi said that since the mobile payments business is “90 percent dependent on the mobile industry, it was unfair that the mobile networks are prevented from advertising their various mobile payment products, which are the foundation on which the bank products operate.
“From the customer’s mobile phone, to the mobile payments system and feedback to the mobile phone, the mobile payment transaction utilizes mostly mobile resources, makes use of mobile time and is supported largely by mobile engineers, but unfortunately the CBN has restricted telecom companies from advertising in the mobile payments space,” Kuponiyi added.
He urged the government to think twice before allowing banks to push new strategies that leave telecom operators behind.
David Eto
