By Segun Oniyide
Airtel Nigeria has become the number two mobile phone operator in Nigeria by subscriber base, a position it lost a few years ago to rival Globacom.
However, the question now is can Airtel Really keep Globacom at bay permanently this time? This is so especially considering the fact that both telecommunications where sanctioned heavily By the Nigerian Communications Commission for poor quality of service.
A key highlight of the latest market information from the telecoms regulator revealed that Airtel Nigeria with 26,194,336 active connections now controls 21% of the telecoms market while Globacom dropped to third place with 24,490,650 active lines and 20% percent market share as at February this year.
MTN Nigeria retains the top spot as the largest mobile operator in Nigeria by subscriber numbers having 45% market share representing 57,183,745 active lines within the same period, the official market information shows.
Also, the total number of active lines has increased from 127,960,580 in January this year to 129,002,841 active connections by February.
Considering all the facts stated above resulting to Airtel Nigeria becoming the number two mobile phone operator in Nigeria, will they be consistent enough to retain the second position looking at the sudden rise in number of active lines that increased from 127,960580 to 129,002,841 which is one of the reason they came second,
On internet subscribers, MTN also came tops with 32.81 million data users on its network, followed by Glo with 14.91 million, Airtel occupies the third position with 9.65 million, while Etisalat has 6.11 million internet users. which means if Airtel did not try as much as possible to keep Glo at bay permanently by maintaining its positive statistics the chance of permanently keeping the second position could be as solid as vapour.
Airtel’s subscriber growth might have occurred as a result of the mobile number portability regime, as the operator performed better than Glo in the number of subscribers that moved to its network, Airtel network received a net gain of 15,186 new subscribers from number porting, while Globacom lost 309 subscribers. Since the sector’s deregulation
Meanwhile, Etisalat Nigeria, the number four by subscriber numbers now has 14% market share with 18,119,397 active lines at at February this year and Etisalat was not involved in the sanction regime meted out by the Nigerian Communications Commission.
