CENTRAL BANK OF NIG. AND 9MOBILR

$1.2bn Debt: New Investors Take Over 9mobile In 6 Months
Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mr. Godwin Emefiele, disclosed this while providing fresh insight into the telco’s operations at the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting in Abuja yesterday. According to Emefiele, the advisers have also been appointed to chart a way for new investors for the troubled telecom firm. Already, the CBN governor said potential investors had shown interest and that expression of interests would be opened with advisers advertising the bidding process to the business community.
“The company’s Advisers have been appointed to provide a process for major investors to intervene in the company and take it over. Potential investors have shown interest, so what would happen is that, these interests would be made opened; the advisers would advertise for RSP, everybody can conduct their due diligence after that.
The best will win. Therefore, we are not moved at all for the change,” he said. He also explained that the intervention by the apex bank and the telecoms regulator was done to avert possible job losses as well as protecting the interest of stakeholders.
It would be recalled that the company changed its name from Etisalat to 9Mobile after its foreign partners pulled out. 9Mobile has been facing some financial crises since Mubadala Development Company of United Arab Emirates, the company’s largest shareholder, pulled out its investment from the country.
Mubadala, an Abu Dhabi Government-owned investment and development company, controls about 70 per cent of the shares in Etisalat along with Etisalat UAE mobile, with Emerging Markets Telecommunications Services (EMTS), promoted by Hakeem Bello- Osagie, owning the remaining 30 per cent. Although reports from NCC revealed that Etisalat had been attracting more subscribers porting from other networks to its network, it has, however, lost over 3.5 million subscribers.
However, Emefiele said in spite of its seeming challenge at the moment, 9Mobile recorded N16 billion revenue in June this year.
“The issue is that, whereas the regulators, the NCC and the CBN, in this case, businesses and companies that operate in the telecoms market, should operate profitably, but we also expected that whatever decision they take should not be such that would affect other stakeholders in that industry.
“We all know that Etisalat is one of the four biggest telecommunication firms in Nigeria, with a subscriber base of over 20 million; and of course, we also know that the revenue base of the company is also very robust.
“It is important that we should not just allow any creditor who feels disadvantaged, to take a decision that hurts other important stakeholders that operate within Etisalat.
“That was what the NCC and the CBN observed that the activities and the attempt by some creditors were going to leave a dismemberment of that company and we could not allow the millions of subscribers to be running helter-skelter without services, and that we could not allow 4,000 or more employees of this company to just run in disarray because something wrong has happened,” he added. Emefiele explained the reason why NCC, supported by the CBN, decided to intervene.
“We only came in to say, ‘please gentlemen, we understand all your interests in this company either you are a creditor or stakeholder, let’s take things easily so that we do not hurt the interest of others who also have interest in this company,” said Emefiele while justifying the intervention.
According to him, “the intervention has been positive, and Etisalat has retained its subscriber base. Its 4,000 staff have continued their work and, indeed, the revenue for the month of June has remained stable at not less than N16 billion.
“A lot of people, who were watching from the sideline thought that Etisalat’s revenue was going to drop drastically and that there was going to be slide to subscriber base, but that was not the case.
“The intervention through the institutionalisations of an