The Nigerian government plans to widen oversight on lottery services offered by telecoms companies in the country.
To drive this forward the telecoms and lottery sectors regulators have signed a pact to work together to broaden their oversight over regulation of lottery promotion by telcos.
The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), the telecoms watchdog and the National Lottery Regulatory Commission (NLRC), the lottery counterpart say thet have reviewed their existing MoU “to accommodate trends in the industry to streamline the strategies needed to ensure the implementation of the MoU.”
Following the review, NCC would withdraw their approval whenever NLRC withdraws its permit from service providers for lottery, “considering the fact that NCC gives approval only when permit has been obtained from NLRC”, the agencies announced in a statement.
Professor Umar Garba Danbatta, Executive Vice Chairman, NCC says that because lotteries are electronically-driven across the world “there is no better infrastructure that is amenable to the conduct of lotteries in Nigeria than the telecommunications infrastructure.”
Professor Umar Garba Danbatta, Executive Vice Chairman, NCC says that because lotteries are electronically-driven across the world “there is no better infrastructure that is amenable to the conduct of lotteries in Nigeria than the telecommunications infrastructure.”
The telecoms regulator said that “bringing any additional service on the infrastructure adds additional burden to the networks, therefore, the Commission is concerned that any additional service added to the networks could or may degrade quality of service.
“That is why the NCC has to be involved to ensure that telecom operators who will be participating in hosting the lottery services have the capacity to do so whereas the National Lottery Regulatory Commission will ensure the credibility of the process by making sure that whatever prices promised those who will participate in the lotteries are given to them.”
Danbattta said that proceeds of lotteries would go to prize winners and some would go to charity and there will also be tax benefits to government as well as to NLRC and NCC.
Lanre Gbajabiamila, Acting Director General, NLRC, said that the agency needed to sign the MoU since the lottery and gaming industry is merged with the telecommunications industry.
According to him, “lotteries have been in retail shops, but now, it has advanced to telecommunications platforms whereby Value Added Services (VAS) providers and telecoms service providers use the telecommunications platforms to do lotteries and gaming, hence we needed to have this collaboration and MoU signed.”
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