Nigeria and other West African countries experienced general internet service disruption on Thursday as consumers were unable to place voice calls as well as carry out other internet related activities.
In Lagos, Nigeria’s commercial hub, consumers of mobile network services of major providers especially Mtn, complained bitterly of inability to connect either voice or data calls for the significant part of the day. Banking transactions were also massively disrupted in th city according to reports.
The Nigerian Communications Commission confirmed the disruption and attributed it to undersea cable cuts along the WestAfrican Coast.
A statement by the Commission’s Director of Public Affairs, Ruben Muoka on Thursday said the cut which occurred somewhere in Cote d’Ivoire and Senegal caused the disruption in Nigeria and several other countries including Ghana, Senegal and Ivory Coast.
The statement read in part: “The cuts occurred somewhere in Cote de’Ivoire and Senegal, with an attendant disruption in Portugal.
“Cable companies – West African Cable System (WACS) and African Coast to Europe (ACE) in the West Coast route from Europe have experienced faults while SAT3 and MainOne have downtime.
“Similar undersea cables providing traffic from Europe to the East Coast of Africa, like Seacom, Europe India Gateway (EIG), AsiaAfrica-Europe1 (AAE1), are said to have been cut at some point around the Red Sea, resulting in degradation of services across on these routes.”
NCC, however, assured that affected operators have started efforts to rectify the situation and improve on their services.
“They have promised to work round the clock to ensure that services are restored to the affected countries within the shortest possible time”, NCC said.
