October 19, 2021
By: Aruna Kamara (BO)
Customers of the Sierra Leone Telecommunication (SIERRATEL) in Bo are bitterly grumbling about the poor delivery of service by the state- own mobile network.
They made this statement at a Mini Consumer Parliament held at the regional office of NATCOM along Sewa Road in Bo last Week.
The General Manager of Radio Bo KISS 104 FM, Samuel Haffner said that ‘ I have SIERRATEL internet model but is not useful to him as most times I find it difficult to use, due to poor service’’.
He suggested that if the state owned mobile network cannot provide the needed services for its customers, let it be privatized in order to function effectively.
Another Customer, Jusu Mattia said that it is really disgraceful to note that a state owned company cannot be catered for in ensuring that it has competitive advantage over the private mobile network operators.
Reacting to the allegation, a senior staff of the Sierra Leone Telecommunication (SIERRATEL) in Bo, Simon Musa has said that they are most times running out of fuel to power the generators to enhance effective and efficient service to their customers.
A former member of Parliament in Bo District, Hon Mansaray said that when he was in parliament they advocated for a bail out for SIERRATEL and since then the state owned Mobile Network is still challenged with effective operation.
He said that he does know whether they have management problems as insinuated by the customers but noted that he cannot subscribe to the statement that the state owned network should be privatized.
Musa Kamara , the Vice Chairman of Bike Riders Union said that the poor service delivery is a result of poor leadership and called on government to also look into the constrains of fuel as hinted by a senior staff of SIERRATEL.
The Chairperson of the Consumer Oversight Committee , Robert K Kargbo has said that as part of its operational oversight function as provided in section 9 inclusive of the Telecommunications Act,2006 as amended, which is geared towards appraising NACTCOM with the operations of Mobile Network Operators(MNOs) the board of the commission organized the Mini Consumer Parliament at regional level to collect feedbacks from stakeholders, partners and other sector players of MNOs within their respective regions in order to inform them on its future engagement and intervention as required by law.
He said that the Mini Consumer Parliament is a follow up mechanism to know whether the MNOs fulfill their commitment during the national Consumer Parliament held at Towama location of Njala University last year.